


The Witch

by Mayday_Hoover



Category: Portal (Video Game)
Genre: Age Difference, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Human, And she is not mute, Aristocracy, Background Het, Cave is Chell's father, Chell is a princess, Dark Past, F/F, Fairy Tale Elements, Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, Glados is a witch, Minor Original Character(s), Phobias, Princes & Princesses, Slow Burn, Songfic, Witches
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-21
Updated: 2020-12-29
Packaged: 2021-03-03 00:35:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 16
Words: 28,987
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24306013
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mayday_Hoover/pseuds/Mayday_Hoover
Summary: At the age of eighteen, by tradition, the princess must choose a groom. And the princess was cursed just the day before...
Relationships: Chell/GLaDOS
Comments: 3
Kudos: 50





	1. Their Majesties

**Author's Note:**

  * A translation of [Ведьма](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/623302) by Мэйдэй Хувер. 



> HOW TO TRANSLATE IDIOMS  
> Well, excuse me, I translate as I can. Again. Haha.  
> Kind of fairy tale, I guess. With lesbians.

The kingdom was shaking - to the capital, to the capital! All carts with honey, wine, fowl and meat flowed into the capital. Hotels, taverns, and even some attics and basements were crowded with a variety of people, and guests only arrived and arrived.  
Flags were hung on the streets, in some places people painted and repaired the very rickety houses and fences, dug apple trees and cherries, and especially lemon trees in the royal garden.  
Traders of fabrics and various accessories of the ladies' toilet crowded all day at the gates of the castle in the hope that His Majesty’s steward would come out and honor them with his attention.  
An accidental foreigner would have decided that the kingdom had won the war or was preparing some great state holiday - such was the scope of preparations and such was the mood of the people. This foreigner, in general, would not be so far from the truth - the holiday was fast approaching, and all the inhabitants of the kingdom hoped to properly celebrate it.  
The eighteenth birthday of the princess was approaching.

"His Highness, august Prince Wheatleybald!" - with excessive pathos announced the ceremoniesmaster. Chell pulled on a sour smile, struggling to quietly scratch her elbow on the fence. Near the gate, she and her father met high-ranking guests who arrived, as always, in advance.  
A skinny and stooping young man in gold-rimmed glasses, making his already big silly eyes simply huge, got out of a carriage with a coat of arms in the form of a pale blue fir cone in the halo of dark green needles. A silver-embroidered suit of blue and dark blue silk, although noticeably sewn, hung a little on the prince.  
August Wheatleybald awkwardly bowed before the king and the princess. Chell reluctantly made an elegant, albeit somewhat cheeky curtsy. Her father, the King, only nodded, pursing his lips with all his might so as not to laugh.  
"Your Majesty, how good it is to see you again!" - the prince exclaimed a little more servile than it should be. The king nodded again. Chell could not stand it and covered her mouth with a palm, diligently portraying a cough.  
"Sorry, _Wheatley_ ", - she smiled softly, mentally smiling from the way the prince shook from such a reduction in his name, - "I got a little cold. Glad to see you, prince".  
"M-m-me too, Your H-Highness", - Wheatley forced a reciprocal smile and held out his hand so that the princess would put her hand in it, and he could kiss it. However, Chell just stared at the outstretched hand with curiosity, pretending not to understand what the prince needed. After standing for a few seconds, Wheatley drew back his hand, as if from a fire, nervously adjusted his glasses and bowed his head meekly. - "L-let me ... L-leave and take a rest from the road?"  
"We let you, my friend", - the king nodded a third time, lifting the corners of his lips. Chell kindly stepped aside, and Wheatley was able to escape to the guest quarters, without looking at anyone.  
As the prince's footsteps subsided, Chell and the king snorted for so long a pent-up laugh.  
"August!" - Cave the First laughed so that the buckles on his boots tinkled. - "He is as august as I am a baker!"  
"Did you see how he twitched?" - Chell wiped the tears from her laughter, trying to catch her breath. - "Wheatley! Well, the real Wheatley! The same important bump, as always!"  
"And again, he couldn’t even squeeze out “hand, dear”!" - Cave slapped his pocket on his trousers and grinned. - "Sagging like a milk-and-water girl! I swear by all the Gods, such a fool in front of the peacock in the royal garden will begin to shy! Well, I hope, child, we don’t even consider him?"  
Chell frowned.  
"You know, dad. I wouldn’t..."  
"Well, well, we discussed it already, sweetie", - Cave took off his impressive leather glove, stretched out his hand, and gently stroked the top of his daughter's hair. She herself would never begin to lay her hair in such an intricate figure, but the princess was required to amaze visitors with her splendor.  
This part, however, was not loved by both the daughter and father.  
The princess bowed her head and sighed.  
"I know, dad. Traditions and all that".  
"You see, you are my clever girl", - the king himself sighed and looked at a string of carriages with various emblems. - "You know... Maybe you shouldn't stand here? It’s not necessary to amaze all of them with how pretty you are. There is a reason why they all dragged here! I will meet them myself. Run".

Quickly rising to her room, Chell carefully locked the door and began to turn in front of the mirror. Few people knew this, but Crown Princess Johnson preferred to change clothes on her own, and the king father, being unable to resist the requests of his beloved daughter, ordered her dresses that allowed her to do this. Therefore, having tinkered a bit, the girl herself unlaced the corset and loosened the belt on her skirt, easily threw off her dress and remained in some trousers hidden under her skirt with rolled up trouser legs. Chell straightened them, fastened her bodice and a wide men's shirt, threw an orange vest on top.  
No matter how strange it may sound, the princess felt much better in trousers than in a dress. She knew very well that not all the women of the kingdom wore dresses, but, as her father said, she "seemed to be supposed to be of origin." Cave often spoke of this or that duty of the monarch, spoke with a wistful sigh, or rolled his eyes. Sometimes Chell thought that her father would have been much more fun if he had been born not as a future king, but at least a small nobleman, and even better - just a free citizen. Maybe he would be carried away by alchemy, in the end he would build a big house, and there would constantly be something fun exploded.  
The girl shook her head, driving away gloomy thoughts, and began with particular displeasure to sort her hairstyle. No, she liked the skill of the court hairdresser, but too many hairpins had to be pulled out of the hair. And in general, to dissolve hair after the artist’s artistic delights, Chell had to spend about half an hour - and this despite the fact that she cut her hair quite short, almost to the shoulder blades!  
Finally, when the last hairpin came to be on the dressing table, the princess shook her freed head with pleasure, pulled her hair into a high ponytail and pulled a hat with a low sharp top over her forehead. She looked at herself and, satisfied, not wearing shoes, in stockings visible from under her trousers, Chell ran out of the room.


	2. The curse

Kaura mare, faithful to the princess only, gracefully glided along a narrow rut between a row of carriages stretching to the castle and a low stone fence of the road. The princess rode away from the castle, while various nobles (some of them, by the way, claimed her hand and heart, huh!) drove to the fortress wall. Chell was amused by one thought. If one of these fools, some of whom could even give a head start to Whеаtley, looked out the window of his decorated box on wheels and wanted to look into the back of this random rider, then on the back of the vest they would be amazed to see the personal coat of arms of Her Highness the Princess - a large snow-white water lily bordered by cheerful green. How could you compare the pale, like its master, coat of arms of a fool Whеаtley to her personal flower!  
But no one, of course, thought of looking out of his safe, comfortable carriage, and the coachmen were not very interested in some girl in orange, albeit very tidy. Chell grinned and spurred the mare.

The riding boots pulled from the stable with her horse dangled a little on Chell, so she slipped her feet into the stirrups and almost let go of the reins, trusting the horse. The sensitive animal, as if obeying the mood of the mistress, turned not onto the wide city road, from where a number of carriages that had already dried up here stretched, but towards the paths trodden by people and animals, each of which led one way or another into the forest.  
Chell nodded, and the horse walked a little faster.

In the forest, under the dense crowns that gave a cool shadow, the princess liked much more than in the company of potential suitors and servants. Not that she didn’t like being a princess at all, but Chell would have preferred the castle to be a little quieter. And less crowded.  
The girl drove a little longer, gladly pushing through the branches and bushes, for fifteen minutes in a row she had scratched her hands and spoiled her clothes. Sometimes Chell thought about fleeing somewhere to a distant land and becoming a knight, a soldier, or at least going into mercenaries - they said that skilled women were valued no less than men, and the princess knew how to handle weapons! On this, as the princess very inappropriately recalled, the king insisted.  
The girl frowned. It was a pity for both father and herself. He disliked the idea of urgently choosing a groom for his daughter no less than the princess herself, but over him hung two whole Swords of Damocles - duty and traditions. The duty ordered the king to acquire a male heir until the end of his monarch's life, which he, at the death of his beloved queen, could not fulfill, and therefore all hope lay on Chell's future son; traditions guided public opinion - and if loyal subjects probably would have understood why the king is in no hurry to arrange the wedding of his daughter, then the rulers of neighboring countries, many of whom had adult single sons themselves, would not accept any excuses.  
"Well, certainly not this fool!" - Chell jerked, and she slightly slapped mare on the croup with her hand, so that her girl would go even faster.

***

The broom rested on a pile of soft moss, which the woman then also planned to take home. Slowly, she stuck a small knife in the chaga plate at the very base, where the chaga grew from the trunk, and began to cut the mushroom. Nearby stood a basket lined with a gray towel, in which several chanterelles, fresh acorns, two fly agarics and a large tarred fir cone were already lying.  
"Well, well..." - the woman pulled the handle of the knife towards herself, and the layer of chaga with a creak separated from the trunk, remaining in the hands of the collector. The woman carefully wrapped the chaga in paper and laid it on top of other goods in a basket. - "It seems to be all. No?"  
The broom on a pile of moss stirred and smoothly turned around with a shaft towards the nearest path visible from behind the trees.  
"What?.. Ah, yes, lilies of the valley. Completely forgot. Thank".  
The woman threw the broom onto her shoulder, gracefully shook off the hem of a black dress with long sleeves, took a basket and went to the path.

Right in the middle of the path, due to the abandonment almost covered with grass, a wild little chamomile grew. The woman in black stopped in front of it, admiring the fragile little white petals.  
"Look, for the first time this year I come across a chamomile", - she bent over the flower and touched the yellow center. At the tip of the index finger it left a few crumbs of pollen. - "Usually chamomiles portend us something good, right?"  
The broom swung by itself. The woman lifted it up to take it off her shoulder, when suddenly a horse burst in front, very close, and a few steps away from the woman, apparently, at the last moment, seeing the black shaft, the rider stopped.  
The women looked at each other bewildered for several seconds, after which Chell opened her mouth, but the stranger threatened to raise her eyebrows and said with contempt:  
"Look where you are riding".  
"Well, excuse me", - the princess snorted. - "It's not me who appears in the middle of the road in a dark forest, dressed in black! It would be easier for you to simply throw yourself under the hooves of my horse, you know".  
"Do not be rude to me, girl", - the woman sat up slowly, but immediately remembered the chamomile, and she again had to put the basket on the ground and throw off the broomstick from her shoulder. Chell, who had been looking at her strange baggage all this time, grinned at her thoughts.  
"Why are you still here?" - the woman in black began to get annoyed. Chell put her hand to her cheek thoughtfully.  
"Why do you need a broom? Are you a witch?"  
"In your opinion, I’m more likely a manual, since you ask such stupid questions", - said the stranger, carefully digging a chamomile with a knife. Chell smiled.  
"Ah, well, sorry. I really didn’t notice you, I thought too much..."  
"I have no desire to know the details of this ridiculous meeting", - snapped out the woman, pulled the stalk and took out a flower with a piece of turf. Then she lovingly wrapped its roots in a piece of paper and attached it in a basket.  
"Do you want me to send you garden chamomiles? As an apology", - Chell leaned to one side to dismount, but at the same moment, almost black broomsticks poked into the mare's face.  
"Stop pissing me off", - clearly, in a voice full of anger, the woman ordered rather than uttered. - "Otherwise, you will receive an answer to the question whether I am a witch ahead of time and you will not like it".  
"Ah, come on..." - the girl tried to apologize, - "I just..."  
"Enough!" - the stranger raised her voice quite a bit, but the forest around, full of bird singing and mysterious rustling, suddenly fell silent. - "I’m tired of you to the extreme! Definitely, I should teach you a lesson".  
"Ah, so you _are_ a witch!" - in Chell's voice, to the woman's displeasure, there was no fear — curiosity alone. The woman stomped irritably and threw up her hands. The princess, as if spellbound, stared at the blue sparks running down woman's thin long fingers.  
"The lesson will go for the future..." - muttered a stranger, fingering all the punishments available to her. Turn the girl into a frog? What's the point? She’ll come to her, and the woman was annoyed by the abundance of extra sounds.  
Burn in place? The lesson will come out that way. What will a person understand when she is burning?  
To curse?..  
"Well", - woman grinned, - "and you, perhaps, are going to some beautiful son of a rich farmer or a famous poet, huh? You don’t look like a very poor peasant, but what else can a girl do on her way from the capital these days?"  
"Well, actually..." - Chell tried to insert, but the stranger casually waved.  
"Quiet! I know you perfectly, insufferable girls!" - the woman extended her arms, and a cold blue flame struck the princess. - "From now on, it will be so that not a single man, mortal or immortal, will fall in love with you!"  
"...In a romantic way?" - Chell specified, shivering from the cold. The stranger arched a thin brow.  
"What?.. In a romantic, of course! And let this be a lesson to..."  
The girl suddenly screeched happily, dashingly jumped off the horse and squeezed the stranger in her arms. Air became overwhelmed with the smells of herbs and fresh tar - after all, the girl rode through the forest for a long time.  
The witch froze in amazement - her curses had never caused so many delights.  
"My savior!" - Chell laughed, already letting the stranger out of her hands and again jumping onto the horse, snorting impatiently. - "Damn it, if your words are true - I invite you to my birthday!"  
"Really needed!" - the woman got angry, grabbed the basket, elegantly, despite her anger, got on the broomstick and retired through the air with her head proudly raised.  
Chell looked for a while at the small bare feet, visible from beneath the black hem and located even in the air as elegantly as their owner, smiled to herself, unfolded the mare and rushed home.


	3. Narcissus

Upon returning to the castle, Chell first decided to check how the curse works. To do this, of course, she needed a man who at least would have liked the princess, not to mention love - the princess did not believe that at least one of the nobles was seriously in love with her.  
Therefore, the girl quickly changed clothes back in her dress and went to look for Baron Rick.

Baron Rick was the most famous court lady-killer. His manner of communicating with women usually consisted exclusively of flirting and compliments, but he treated the princess a little more cleverly, seeing in her more than just a beautiful girl. However, the flirting behavior was leaking out every now and again. Of course, it would have been easier to stumble upon Whеаtley, but the princess did not want to know about this fool whether he was in love with her or not.  
However, the first man Chell came across was not one of the admirers, but her own father.  
"Sweetie!" - the king looked around and hugged his daughter tightly. - "They have almost staged a riot! Everyone require a future birthday girl!"  
"Everyone in the ballroom?" - Chell listened to the hum of human voices nearby. Cave nodded.  
"Everyone is waiting for you, sun! Come on, don’t be afraid, the swords on the walls hang not only for decoration". Chell grinned.  
"I don’t think it will come to this... Okay, I’ll go".  
Before entering the ballroom, the princess stopped, released her hair, put on a hairband on her wrist, took a white rose from one of the vases that always stood along the corridors, and laid it in her ear.  
A girl appeared in the hall with shine, as she was the only one with her hair loose and her shoulders open. There was a servile ovation.  
"Milady! Milady! We are waiting only for you!" - shouted the young officers who came with the fathers-generals for the same thing as the "important bump", only were much more fun than him. Chell smiled at them very sweetly, and the young officers froze in their tracks, squinting with incomprehension, but continuing to smile back.  
A whisper ran through the ballroom.

"Have you seen Rick?" - Chell kindly asked one of the baroness mothers that they had also dragged their sons here in the hope of becoming related to the royal family. The princess was pointed to a table with drinks, near which a flock of ladies and gentlemen gathered and from where came a cheerful hubbub.  
Rick quite expectedly showed up right in the middle of this flock. He put one foot on a chair, holding on to the back of the chair, and actively gestured with one hand, telling something enthusiastically. The baron dressed for the holiday in the colors of his coat of arms - golden yellow and green, the same as that of a narcissus flower embroidered on his pockets, shirt collar and even on a hat ribbon. He wore fashionable boots with shiny buckles and curved sharp toes. Rick's hair and graceful dandy beard with a mustache seemed to be a little pomaded - in general, if Chell did not know him, then maybe she would take the baron for a prince or even a young king. Single, of course.  
"...And so, I load the gun", - in a whisper, but loud enough to be heard two meters away, Rick said. - "Click, and suddenly - crack on the right! I turned around, praying to all the Gods at once, but especially, of course, to my patroness, Fortune, and what do I see?"  
"What?" - one of the young ladies exclaimed subtly, half to death of a frightened hint of blood. Rick shot her one of his best looks, grinned predatoryly and pretended to aim from a gun.  
"I turn around, and there in the bushes there is a wild boar! And not just a boar - a huge boar! Let me cut off my right hand if its snout would not reach the height of my stomach!.. And the fangs, what kind of fangs this animal had! Damn it, these were not fangs, these were whole dragon teeth!"  
"Was it angry?" - asked another, very pale young lady, who seemed to be listening very attentively. Rick gave her a dazzling, burning look, after which he nodded.  
"Not that word! Was it evil? Yes, it would have torn me to pieces right away if it had not been, as I noticed a few seconds later, completely blind. Can you imagine? Probably scoured the bushes in search of acorns, and here I am, aiming at a deer!"  
A delighted sigh swept through the crowd.  
"So", - Rick continued after a dramatic pause, - "I see a wild boar, I begin to slowly turn on it to save my own life, and suddenly it begins to roar! Do you know how wild boars terribly roar? Oh, this is truly a hell of a sound! Especially when it is literally five steps away from you!"  
"Oh, Gods!" - the first lady did faint from her own excessive imagination. One of the gentlemen, particularly dissatisfied with the attention given to the baron, picked her up in his arms and led her away from the narrator. Rick, however, was not upset at all, and, having sustained one more dramatic pause, threw up an imaginary gun.  
"Oh, yes, I swear to the Gods, I was also taken aback for a second! If it were two seconds, I would certainly die - the beast would smell me, and would immediately raise it to its terrifying fangs! But I managed to point the barrel of the gun directly on its forehead and pull the trigger!"  
"What a courage!" - exclaimed admiring young ladies and awarded the baron with applause. Chell stood to one side, arms folded across her chest, and listened without much interest. There were about two hundred similar hunting stories in Rick’s repertoire, and the princess rightly believed that at least two dozen of them were true.  
However, the girl did not mind, since it distracted the guests and the baron from her person.

As soon as Rick finished describing the hanging of a huge boar's head over his fireplace, the princess gently poked him in the back. The baron immediately turned around and smiled.  
"Take a look! Her Highness has finally descended to illuminate us with Her presence!" - the baron took his foot off the chair, bowed and kissed the girl's hand. Giving a hand to Rick was not so unpleasant for her as to the prince.  
"I just returned from a horse ride", - Chell smiled. - "I bet you didn’t notice me at the entrance to the castle".  
"Gods, I really haven’t seen you!" - Rick was surprised, looking at the princess more attentively than usual. - "And you... You somehow... have changed!"  
"Yes indeed", - Chell answered in a slightly trembling voice. To her joy, any hint of flirting disappeared in the look of the baron, there was only surprise and confusion. - "Ah, you would know how glorious to ride a horse now in the forest shade!"  
"I think that is very good", - one of the gentlemen smiled blissfully, looking somewhere through the princess - probably, in his thoughts he ran away just into the woods in the saddle of his beloved horse.  
"You think right", - Chell smiled slyly. - "Baron, can I steal you from your fans for a short while?"  
"Um... Yes, of course, my princess", - Rick gave her a hand, and the princess and the baron disappeared behind one of the columns of the ballroom.

Chell deliberately chose a free place where mothers or sisters of her potential grooms would not talk, let go of Rick's hand and leaned her back against a cool wall.  
"Did you want to talk about something?" - the baron smiled, still perplexed but polite. The princess nodded, gathering her thoughts.  
"Baron, tell me... You are the smartest young man I know".  
"Oh princess, I am infinitely flattered..." - Rick reached for the hat, but the girl waved her hand.  
"Leave, otherwise I'll be disappointed in you instantly! So, you are alone, despite your coquetry, talking to me as a person with a person, and not like a mouse with a cat. So you, sir, confess honestly to me, looking in the eyes - do you like me as a woman?"  
"Um..." - Rick touched the hat ribbon several times, staring blankly at the princess's dress. He continually tried to pull his hat off his head - honesty and respect for the princess fought in him with his own manner of communication and the standards of behavior of the royal court.  
Finally, Rick put his hand on the top of his hat and muttered: "You are... It's just a question, isn't it?"  
The princess nodded. The baron sighed and still took off his hat from his magnificent curls.  
"No, I do not, princess! I'm afraid Your Highness ... You have strangely changed since our last meeting... This is so strange! In my mind, I understand that you are as beautiful and brilliant as always, but my heart does not seek to attract you, like other fish on this holiday!"  
To Rick's even greater amazement, the princess was not angry, but laughed happily and made a curtsy.  
"I did not need more from you, my friend! Go, have fun, you are waiting there!"


	4. Courtesy of Kings

The next morning, Chell woke up absolutely happy. Yesterday, with the joy of the curse working, the princess participated in all the conversations and danced all the dances she was called to. From this, her legs and throat were a little sore now, but this did not overshadow the girl’s joy.

"You are unusually fun today, sweetie", - Cave the First noted with pleasure at their usual common breakfast. Chell smiled, spreading butter on a piece of bread in a thick layer.  
"No need to say, dad".  
"Did you like last night? How then you will like your own birthday!"  
"No need to say!" - Chell laughed, remembering the angry woman in black and two lovely pale feet. The king sighed happily, looking at his joyful daughter, and sipped coffee with a slice of lemon.  
"I see that you don’t worry so much that you have to choose... One of these youths? You know, if you have a candidate, I would like to..."  
"Something tells me that none of them will even take my hand, daddy", - the princess grinned. The king wiped his lips with a napkin and arched an eyebrow.  
"Why is this? You are a well-educated smart girl, ride horses, fight with swords, and shoot from a gun! How can they not take such a treasure?"  
"Well, I'm afraid none of them like me anymore, like a woman", - Chell giggled, looking inquiringly at her father.  
"How is that?"  
"Well, I am..." - the princess suddenly thought that her father might not be so pleased with the “gift” of the witch, even though the girl herself considered it to be such. - "I, um... In general, I met yesterday... Someone... In the forest".  
"Who did you meet?" - the king-father poured some milk into the tea for his daughter, who did not tolerate wine, and moved the cup. Nothing prevented them from sitting at either end of the long table in the dining room, but they preferred to sit on adjacent chairs.  
"The witch", - Chell sighed. - "And she, um... I, um, accidentally ran into her on a horse, and she... She, this witch, cursed me. Sort of".  
"What?!" - Cave immediately grabbed the girl by the shoulders. - "For Gods' sake! Why are you silent about this? Where did you meet her? Did she threaten to turn you into a frog? What did she do?!"  
"Calm dad, I'm fine!" - Chell clutched her father's arms — with such force he clung to her shoulders in fright. - "She just said that a man will never fall in love with me!"  
"...In a romantic way?" - specified His Majesty. Chell nodded. - "Phew... Creator!" - he removed his hands from daughter’s shoulders and rubbed his forehead. For a while, the king and princess were silent while he thought, and she quietly drank tea and waited. - "We have to go and ask her to remove the curse", - Cave sighed.  
"But why?" - princess got up. - "This is incredibly convenient! None of them will want to marry me, and if they want, then you can tell about the curse and add something like the one who marries me will die... Something like that! And I won’t have to..."  
"Sweetie, then they’ll _decide_ to go and kill this dear witch of yours", - Cave sighed once more. - "No, of course I am grateful to her, knowing what you are, but you have to go to remove the curse".  
"And if I don’t tell them, where did I meet her and what does she look like?" - the girl muttered. The princess, after all, felt sorry for the stranger.  
"This is even worse! They will then begin to bring us ten “witches” a day!"  
The king and princess sighed at the same time.  
"Okay... Yes, you are probably right. Need to go and ask her to remove the curse", - Chell frowned. Cave smiled encouragingly and took her hand.  
"Do you want to go together? We will be moderately polite, and if necessary - royally generous, and everything will be settled".  
"Okay", - the girl squeezed her father's hand. - "This is... On one of the paths in the forest".

***

To avoid even casual encounters, the woman chose one of the most distant flower meadows for collection. She lacked only a large bouquet of lilies of the valley, and they, as luck would have it, seemed to hide from the witch.  
"Screw you! Do I have to persuade you every time?" - the woman frowned angrily, muttered a few words under her breath, and drew a line in the air. It lit up white and rushed a long line somewhere into the forest. A woman hurried behind its lengthening end.

Breaking through the thicket of acacia, the witch suddenly collided head-on with a girl in an orange vest.  
"You again?" - the stranger finally got angry. - "I said - go away!"  
"It was yesterday!" - Chell grabbed the witch's hand and involuntarily shuddered - the stranger's palm was very cold. - "Listen, we came to apologize!"  
"We?.." - only then did the witch notice that the girl was accompanied by some pretty well-groomed man in years. Quickly and contemptuously looking at him, the woman decided that this was the girl’s father - he was probably afraid that now the girl would not marry, pf! - "You would have brought the whole embassy with you!"  
"Dad would not allow that", - Chell humbly noticed, peering intently into the face of the stranger. Yesterday, she could not see it better, but now, in a more open place, golden yellow eyes, with orange, like fiery, streaks in the irises of a stranger, the princess found truly bewitching. The girl was also amused by the witch's hair, which was literally snow-white, and even sloppy short, slightly elongated in front. And still, the longest strands, framing a beautiful pale face, fell just a few centimeters below the shoulders.  
"We came to ask you to break your curse, lady", - Cave the First, as a sign of special attitude, touched the fields of the hat, as if intending to take it off. The stranger snorted contemptuously.  
"And why would I take it off? You both didn’t apologize".  
"I apologize", - Chell, like a knight, knelt down, taking the stranger's hand in hers. - "Excuse me, please. I should have been more attentive. I am just..."  
"Stop touching me!" - the woman got angry and pulled her palm out of Chell's hands. - "Damn you, idiot! Is it a big deal if one girl is left without a husband? You have nothing to do in life, are you so worthless?"  
The girl exchanged a glance with her father, and with a sigh he took off his hat.  
"Madame..." - Cave began, but the woman snapped:  
"I am not married, thank Gods!"  
"Mademoiselle!" - he immediately corrected himself. - "If it were so simple - I would even thank you for such a gift... I myself do not want to arrange my Chell's wedding so soon, and even for one of these cretins. But this is a matter of national importance. You see, I am Cave Labordian the First".  
The witch stared at the king in disbelief, studied his face for half a minute, and suddenly burst out laughing malevolently.  
"Ah, right! After all, this nose is depicted on the royal thalers!" - she exclaimed. Cave flinched.  
"Wh... What's up with my nose?"  
"Nothing", - the witch snorted, - "where nature laughed — nothing can be fixed! And so, since you are the king, then this rude girl is a princess?"  
"She is", - His Majesty nodded. This tone was unpleasant for him, but arguing with the witch was too dangerous.  
"Huh! How well you bring up the future queen!"  
"Listen!" - Chell frowned, getting up from her knees and proudly straightening up. - "Will you already tell me what to do so that you remove the curse or not? If you simply intend to mock me and dad, then do it alone at least until the end of time, thank you very much!"  
The king involuntarily admired his daughter at that moment - how angry blue eyes shone, how severely she pursed her lips, frowned, just like her mother. He did not notice that the woman in black herself was silent for several seconds, examining the princess and not showing her confusion in any way.  
"All right, huh", - the witch suddenly smiled. - "You, a mischievous girl, apparently also stubborn. So be it, I will give you a chance to earn my forgiveness".  
"To... earn?" - Chell and Cave arched eyebrows equally.  
"Forgiveness must be earned", - woman grinned. - "You’ll work for me for a week or so. I am tired of working alone, I need to command someone!"  
"You are..." - the king began, but Chell interrupted him:  
"Agree! But can I finish before Monday? My birthday is just then, I need to choose a groom".  
"We'll see it", - said the witch, looking at the white track already almost melted in the air. - "Here is your first task - do you see this strip in the air?"  
"I see!" - Chell waved to her father and instantly rushed along the white trail. Cave did not have time to say a word.  
"If she behaves well, you will get her alive and well on Monday morning", - the witch grinned imperiously, and slowly went after the girl.


	5. Spikes

The witch led the princess with a huge bouquet of lilies of the valley they found to her house along the longest path. She already regretted her pride a little, because Gods forbid the girl will remember where she lives! These insignificant people may want to go and burn the witch for fun after the holiday of the princess...  
However, the woman immediately reassured herself. What are these little people compared to her? Yes, she will always be able to cloud the girl’s mind with a couple of simple spells so that she won’t be able to remember even herself, let alone the road somewhere!  
"Excuse me, miss witch!" - the princess called, covering the delicate lily of the valley flowers from the thorns of the bushes through which she had to wade. - "Miss witch, where are we..."  
"Glados", - the woman threw, casually and unhurriedly moving a long elastic branch out of the way so that the girl could slip under her arm. With some kind of gloating, the witch thought that the princess was half her head below her, if not more.  
"Is it your name?" - Chell ducked under her elbow and climbed out onto a narrow path. The witch stepped forward and let go of the branch - it whipped through the thorny bushes.  
"I will not repeat".  
"All right, miss Glados", - the princess smiled quietly. - "My name is Chell".  
"I thought that the name for the royal person should be longer", - Glados noticed, winding between the trees. Chell winced.  
"Well, it's longer. I don't like the full version..."  
The witch grinned and decided somehow for the sake of entertainment to demand from the princess her full name.

Finally, after half an hour of looping and turning, they entered a wide lakeside meadow.  
A small neat house, built of dark spruce logs, was snuggling up to the sisters-spruces so that, perhaps, you could not see it from the forest if you did not pay attention to the green tin chimney. A path lined with red bricks led to a clean shallow lake.  
"Wow, it looks cozy", - Chell was surprised. Glados pursed her lips.  
"If you even mention these stereotypes about dirty shacks and all kinds of demonic things, I will turn you into a spider. Clear?"  
"Clear", - Chell answered, turning her head curiously. Meadow was more like a mixture of flower garden and ususal garden. Here, it seemed to be mixed up, but in a surprising order carrots, currants, dandelions, dill, clung to several peas and tomatoes stuck in the ground, and on the shore, in the sunniest place, sunflowers swayed lazily.  
Sunflowers were protected from water by a small wattle fence.  
"It's beautiful here", - muttered Chell thoughtfully. The witch waved her hand and opened the door.  
"There is nothing to look at, bring in a bouquet. And do not drop anything inside!"

Inside, the house was neat and clean. Two walls were painted with blue and orange flowers, a familiar camomile bloomed in a pot on the window. The stove, the chimney of which a couple of centimeters from the ceiling turned into a tin, almost glowed with a completely fresh whitewash. All the furniture was clean and as if just washed. The princess, accustomed to the cleanliness of the palace rooms, smiled involuntarily.  
"So... Put the flowers on the table", - the witch spread a big scarf. Chell unloaded her valuable burden. - "Finally. So, since I am commanding you, I will probably have to put you somewhere..."  
Glados winced. She didn’t think about it at all - the idea of having a future queen under her command, so that it would be possible to splash out her misanthropy, completely overshadowed the practical part of the matter.  
"I can sleep in the attic", - the princess kindly suggested, stomping on the spot. - "Or on the bench".  
"I will not let you into my attic", - the witch dismissed. - "No, you'd better be under my watch ... Closer. Otherwise, you will break something. Do not touch anything, okay?"  
The girl nodded. Glados rummaged in a large copper-bound chest, pulled out a few shabby but still good raincoats, and laid them on a piece of floor near the stove.  
"Here you will sleep. Clear?"  
"Clear!" - Chell smiled. Such a positive attitude began to annoy the hostess of the house.  
"The first thing is to get some water", - the witch handed the girl an iron bucket, - "into the barrel outside. From the lake".  
"Okay!" - the girl threw a vest and pointed hat onto her new "bed", grabbed a bucket and ran outside.

The witch cheated without telling the princess something about her mission. Chell, generally an active girl, quickly dragged half a barrel of water, but it turned out that the barrel itself had stood unfilled for a long time and dried up. Therefore, the same half of the barrel leaked just as quickly through the slots between the boards.  
Chell stared at the bucket, puzzled. Then she touched the walls of the barrel from the inside, rubbed the pads of her fingers against each other, shrugged, and again ran to the lake.  
The witch peered out from under the curtain. Chell briskly poured the tenth bucket into the barrel.  
"Such a fool", - Glados grinned. The girl once again looked into the barrel, suddenly joyfully jumped up and ran back to the lake.  
Soaking a little with water, the boards in the barrel swelled up and the slots closed. Gradually, it filled, even a little with a top.

Chell returned to the house disheveled and sweaty, but pleased.  
"Well, I guess you are proud of yourself", - the witch contemptuously pursed her thin lips, hands clasped behind her back. - "You know, if you noticed that something was wrong with the barrel, you had to tell me about it".  
"But I filled the barrel!" - Chell put down the bucket and plopped down on a pile of raincoats. - "Ouch... Hard".  
"Excuse me, Your Highness, I did not get swan fluff for you", - Glados grinned venomously. - "But back to the barrel..."  
"But I filled it!" - protested Chell. The witch sighed, leaned over and snapped the princess on the forehead.  
"You spent forty minutes on it. No, tenacity is even good, but in your case it is stubbornness!"  
"Okay, okay", - the girl pouted. - "I will ask you next time".  
Glados snorted. She didn’t really believe it.  
"And why are we seated? Driving through the woods like crazy is forever, but then you did a little work - and you die right away?"  
"Ha!" - Chell jumped to her feet, her eyes sparkling. - "I just wait until you come up with something more complicated!"  
"You asked for it yourself", - the witch pulled her out of the house and led her to the far end of the meadow. There were some crooked thick bushes sticking out of the ground, poked with spikes half a little finger long. Bunches of silver-white berries were hung on small cuttings. - "Come on. I need some of these berries".  
The woman stood at a distance with her arms crossed over her chest, intently watching the princess. Chell walked around the bush, as far as possible, touched the branch and with an annoying hoot pulled her hand back - the thorns were very sharp.  
"Are they poisonous?" - the girl looked back at the witch. She just grunted. Then Chell proudly cocked her head, rolled up her sleeves and tried to stick her hand between the spikes as accurately and as quickly as possible so that the sharp tips did not touch her, but the spikes, as if sensing movement, bent slightly, and immediately a dozen dug into the delicate girl's skin.  
Chell bit her lip and hissed in pain, but still plucked one berry and pulled her hand out of the bush.  
"Where to put them?" - she turned to Glados with a poker face. The woman, still silently, brought a round birch bark box and put it on the ground near the princess.  
The girl put the berry in the box, took the box in her free hand and, starting to feel a slight tingling in the places where the thorns were, continued to pick the berries a little slower.

Things were moving so slowly that the sun managed to reach its zenith and began to descend when Chell appeared on the threshold of the house - pale, panting, but triumphantly clutching a box full of silver-white berries in one hand. The witch who was finishing dinner looked in surprise at the princess, especially her free hand hanging like a lash.  
"Are you still alive?" - she inquired kindly. Chell nodded, stubbornly took a couple of steps and crashed to her knees. The witch first picked up the box, closed it and deftly stuck it on one of the countless shelves along the walls that occupied even the painted parts of the house. Then she rolled up the sleeve on Chell's hanging arm and whistled. The arm was covered in bluish pin marks from the injection, it was slightly swollen, veins became visible, somehow pale against the background of the skin...  
"Fool", - Glados grinned almost affectionately. The room swam in front of the girl's sight. The princess shook her head, tried feebly to object, and collapsed into the hands of the witch.


	6. Grandfather clock

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *humming under her breath* Wake from this coma, took my diploma...  
> Sorry, defended my diploma, heh  
> I'll try to translate a little faster, at least for the order

When Chell woke up, the sun, almost hidden behind the house, painted pink tops of trees on the other side of the lake. Suddenly a measured beat of the clock struck in her ears.  
She did not notice that there was a grandfather clock in the house.

The girl frowned and looked around. Everything floated a little before her eyes, but the feeling that she was drowning in some kind of swamp disappeared. The injured hand burned, but not so much, and besides, it was wrapped in bandages soaked in something cool. Chell herself was put on raincoats. It seems that there were a couple more in the pile for softness.  
There was no witch in the house.  
"Hottie", - the girl grinned and got a little more comfortable, so that the injured arm was less hurt. This witch must have known that the bush was poisonous! And that means she didn’t specifically tell her about it...  
On the other hand, she did not leave the princess to die from the poison in her swollen hand, right? She was not going to kill the girl.  
"Ho-o-ottie", - repeated Chell almost dreamily. Something about this smug sarcastic lady attracted her, definitely.  
"Stop cursing in my house", - Glados snapped out on the threshold, carefully wiping her feet on a small rug. - "This is permissible only to the owner of the house. Or are they no longer teaching banal politeness in castles?"  
"So you didn’t want to kill me?" - Chell tried to raise herself, but the pain in her hand made itself felt, and the girl abandoned the attempt. The witch rolled her eyes and, one by one, put several boxes with silver-white berries on the table near the slightly dried lilies of the valley. - "Oh... You are a master at handling poisonous things, huh?" - the princess smiled weakly.  
"I just know that with ezloi you need to be especially careful", - the witch unceremoniously took the girl by the sore hand and unwound the bandages. The arm was no longer swollen, but traces of injections and pale veins were still visible. - "And you are a fool. You reached into the poisonous bush with your hand, without asking for gloves or anything... It is good that you guessed it was not to put the berry in your mouth!"  
"Pfft... But I got the berries", - Chell threw back her head and smiled weakly, but smugly. The witch pursed her lips and, relentlessly pressing her fingers, smeared the girl’s hand from fingers to elbow with some hot white ointment, after which she again tightly bandaged the hand.  
"People so rampant stupid", - the witch grudged scornfully, letting go of the princess's hand. - "In the end, you just lay unconscious for the rest of the day. Tuesday is lost, Your Highness, and time does not return".  
"I can stay here for at least two weeks if necessary", - Chell winced in pain, but still raised herself on a healthy elbow and stared at Glados with slightly defocused eyes. The witch sighed.  
"Honestly, if I could kill you, I would. It is your happiness that I too despise humanity to dirty my hands on you".  
Chell pulled on a smile, but then fell back onto raincoats.  
"O-oh... How much longer will I feel like that?"  
"In the morning it should end", - the woman unceremoniously threw a cloak on the girl. - "So fall asleep, useless aristocrat, your painful appearance distracts me".

***

The upper edge of the sun barely appeared from behind the fir trees on the other side of the lake when the princess opened her eyes. She felt only a slight tingling sensation in her hand.  
There was an amazing morning silence. Chell looked at the grandfather clock - it showed half past six, and even seemed to work, but almost did not tick.  
"This is strange", - she thought. Maybe this grandfather clock adjusted to the mood of the owner of the house? It seems that yesterday they began to struck not exactly at an hour...  
The princess looked for the witch with a look. Only now she thought that there was no bed in the house. Where then...  
Chell looked up and saw a pale hand with long, thin fingers, clinging frantically to the edge of the stove. "Have you chosen a warmer place?" - the girl grinned mentally and put her healthy hand to the white stove side. The stove was indeed surprisingly warm, although there was no crackle of fire in it, and to throw firewood, Glados would have to climb through Chell’s bed...  
The girl chose not to think about it and looked at the clock. It was the most common grandfather clock with a slightly dull bronze pendulum swinging slowly back and forth behind the glass. They stood in a corner near the chest, and their white clock face was surprisingly highlighted - despite the rapidly growing dawn, the house was still dark.  
Chell raised her eyes to the witch's hand again. If she had more strength, she would sit down and examine the room better, but so far she was terribly unwilling to move.  
The princess began to think about the castle. How will her grooms react when they learn that the princess will be gone for a week? She would even like to look at their faces at the moment when her father would lie to them something. For example, that the girl decided to objectively consider all the candidates and therefore ordered to have fun without her, huh!  
The witch's fingers twitched and scraped the edge of the mattress on the top of the stove. Chell shuddered when she heard a soft, sick moan. Her temporary commander seemed to be dreaming of something unpleasant. However, the princess was not surprised - probably, the witch did not like people so that she was self-isolated, for some reason?..  
The girl decided to ask about this later, at some convenient opportunity.

The clock struck eight. Glados flinched, yawned into the pillow, turned a little and jumped to the floor ten centimeters from the princess’s arm.  
"Ouch", - Chell called expressively. The witch turned around.  
"Oh, I forgot about you. Are you alive? Wonderful, then you will not die either".  
"Huh, don't even rely on it", - Chell somehow sat up and leaned back against the stove. The woman grinned.  
"I did not. Sit at the table, Your Highness".  
Chell got up, went on poorly bent legs to the table, which was standing near the window, and flopped down on a chair. Glados sat opposite.  
"If you live alone, why do you need two chairs?" - muttered Chell in semiconsciousness. She began to stir up from the excessive number of movements for her.  
The witch did not honor the girl with an answer. Instead, she poured a full glass of hissing greenish-pale liquid and slipped the glass directly into the princess's fingers.  
"Drink it", - ordered the woman. Chell lifted a hand to her mouth, took a sip, and then spat out the liquid back into the glass with disgust. - "No, no!" - Glados herself raised the glass along with Chell's palm and brought it to her lips. - "Drink it".  
Princess willy-nilly had to drain the glass. The liquid tasted disgusting, and the bubbles in it only worsened the matter, but after the last drop disappeared in the throat, Chell felt surprisingly good.  
"What is it?" - for want of a napkin, she wiped her lips with the back of her hand.  
"Antidote with a pair of herbs that add energy", - Glados answered with slight contempt. - "I can not believe that I have to spend my supplies on you, lunatic, but if you die, I will not live too. I know you people".  
"What can I do if my dad loves me", - Chell shrugged, feeling her normal vivacity returning to her. - "Parents should love children, right..."  
She was interrupted by the loud rumbling of her own stomach. The princess suddenly remembered that she had not eaten since yesterday’s breakfast. She raised the witch a little embarrassed.  
"Potato soup", - she spread her hands indifferently, - "I can only offer potato soup. Leftovers from yesterday".  
The girl nodded, and Glados went to breakfast for her temporary servant.

While Chell couldn’t fully use her injured hand, Glados had to give her an easier task.  
"Paint the window frame and shutters outside", - she threw, taking a knife and a basket. - "A bucket of paint and a brush are already outside. I will be back in an hour. If you splatter something, I will make you repaint the whole house. Clear?" - Chell nodded readily, somehow rolled up her sleeve on her healthy hand and left the house. - "And try not to get killed somehow!" - the witch asked mockingly, watched as the girl with a brush in her hand peered at the shutters, and disappeared into the forest.  
The princess looked at the brush and the dark blue paint dripping from it. Painting work was not part of her duties, but she had a rough idea of what to do.  
The girl ran a brush over a wood.

***

Glados even felt a little sorry for the girl. She herself learned to handle plants mainly by trial and error, and in most cases she had to try it herself - when her former neighbors didn’t come to hand...  
The witch shook her head, angry at herself. She preferred to keep this part of her life rather deeply in herself.  
In any case, the girl turned out to be pretty strong for the princess, since she did not die after several hours of processing the poisoning with ezloi.  
Glados grinned and carefully cut a fly agaric, just above the mycelium. Poisons were a witch’s special love, she was much better versed in them than the average alchemist with higher education - because most of Glados’s life was devoted to poisons. The witch knew exactly how to kill or permanently disable a person so that he did not even feel it.  
Paradoxically, the witch did not like to kill people. Oh no, they deserved contempt, poisonous remarks, direct sarcastic ridicule, but _death_? Was it worth it to spend the miraculous power of poison, drop by drop drawn from lovingly collected fruits and herbs, on people?  
And mocking the dead would also be boring.

Glados was unusually lucky that day. The hour allotted to the princess had not yet passed, and the witch had already filled the basket with poisonous bellflowers, belladonna, fly agaric, celandine, and even found her weakness - thickets of lily of the valley.  
"Today I do not need you - and you are right there", - Glados grinned, placing the basket on the old, dry stump and kneeling down. Lilies of the valley were one of those little pleasures that the witch allowed herself at every opportunity.  
Glados liked everything about them: a scattering of small white flowers on a long stem, a faint delicate smell, the way the flowers swayed in the wind, like little soundless bells...  
And the little red berries that could be used so nicely for poisons.  
Glados unusually gently stroked the white flower heads, bent over, breathing in the smell, and smiled lightly. Lilies of the valley meant for her all the best that was in life.

Approaching the house, Glados noticed that the princess had stopped painting and was engaged in some kind of nonsense. She ran from the lake to the witch's beds with a small green watering can and watered carrots. Before that, the watering can actually lay on a shelf above her stove.  
The woman grinned.  
"Hey, lunatic", - the princess looked around and smiled joyfully. - "What, you already finished your main work?"  
Chell nodded and went down to the lake again. Glados went to the window.  
The window was painted surprisingly carefully, although not very skillfully. In some places blue smudges gathered below, a few drops darkened on the glass of the window above, but on the whole, it seems, the girl tried very hard to please her.  
"Is it all right?" - asked Chell, running past. The witch hesitated between a sarcastic and approving answer, and yet she chose a more or less neutral one.  
"Fine. It can be seen that the princess worked, but normal. Bring the watering can back to where you got it, and follow me. Apparently, you need to be taught how not to die in the forest before giving any tasks".


	7. Ezloi

To begin with, Glados led Chell to a spiky bush she already knew, humiliated with silver-white berries.  
"Are you serious?" - the girl recoiled. - "I just nearly died because of it, and I need to touch this thing again?.."  
"This plant is called "ezloi"", - Glados lovingly stroked a thin spike at the very base. The plant not only did not prick the witch, but even seemed to slightly divert the spike point from her finger. - "It is extremely poisonous... in large quantities. And for especially hasty".  
The witch quickly drew back her finger, and the spike immediately bent to the side where a woman's hand was a second ago. Chell sighed admiringly.  
"How did you know that?" - blurted out a girl. The witch winced.  
"Be more polite. I am older than you. Have respect for elders, girl, being a princess, queen, or even some goddess".  
"Fine, as you say", - Chell sighed and cautiously reached for the bush. The spikes faltered and slowly began to lean toward her healthy fingers.  
"Slower", - the witch commanded, looking carefully at the spikes. The girl slowed down her movements, and when her fingers touched the surface of the white berry, the poisonous thorns had already deviated to the sides, freely letting the princess hand through. Chell's eyes sparkled with delight. Glados smiled softly. - "You see? Everything requires either skill or a good mentor. Any fool will be able to poison himself with ezloi!"  
"O-o!" - the girl slowly plucked the berry and with the same speed took her hand out of the bush. When only a couple of centimeters remained between the fingers and the spikes, Chell jerked her hand at herself with a quick movement, and the thorns, to her delight, immediately bent to the side where her palm was a second ago. The girl laughed like a child.  
"This is not a toy", - the witch took the berry from the princess. - "You better thank the Gods that for the whole forest, and even for the whole kingdom, there is only one ezloi bush. Mine. Otherwise, one of you, city dumbasses, would certainly have found ezloi in his tea".  
"Where did you get it, miss?" - Chell rubbed her hand in bandages, which from her memories began to tingle inexplicably. The fingers moved quite well.  
"This is a professional secret", - Glados looked at the sun. Judging by its position, lunch was approaching. - "Okay, enough lessons about poisons for today. Now it's lunch, and then a lesson about mushrooms. Your Highness, I suppose, is able to distinguish a mushroom from a flower or a tree?"

On the way to the forest, Chell picked up some dry stick. She carried a witch’s basket on a bandaged arm’s elbow, and a pair of fresh cuts appeared on her healthy hand - Glados instructed her to peel the carrots and cut the onions for dinner, and the princess dropped a knife several times. Of course, the witch herself worked on the scratches, citing the fact that the girl could have poisoned herself through stupidity.  
"Will you ever stop crippling yourself someday?" - Glados glanced with displeasure at the stick in Chell's hand. - "And I would advise you to quit this thing in a good way. You’ll impale yourself with it".  
"I'll be careful", - Chell shrugged and immediately caught a branch in some bush. The witch only pursed her lips and was silently expressive.  
The princess panted, released the branch, and ran after the woman.  
"Just hold the basket", - Glados sighed. - "Otherwise, you confuse your hand with a stipe and pierce it".  
They went around several meadows and paths. The witch looked under a couple of bushes, stopped under a birch, thought for a moment and turned sharply.  
"I know where to go", - she adroitly slipped between the fir trees growing closely to each other, without setting a single needle on the hem of an unchanging black dress. Chell decided not to risk the basket and simply walked around the trees, which took half a minute more than the witch needed due to the density of these thickets. "What a nimble lady", - Chell thought with a smile, coming to the place where the witch should have already appeared from the thicket. But Glados was in the gap between the fir trees, and in the strangest position - the woman froze, clutching her hands to her chest, and her eyes expressed mortal horror. She seemed to even turn paler.  
"Ahem... Miss Glados?" - cautiously called Chell. The witch glanced quickly at the girl and nodded slightly.  
Chell lowered her eyes and saw a small crow standing in the tall grass near the fir tree. The bird sat quietly in place, invisible to the enemies behind the dark green, and looked at the princess, then at the witch with clever eyes.  
"You", - the witch's voice sounded like she had a sharp dry throat. She also spoke in a whisper. - "You. Drive away... Uh... _This_ ".  
"Crow?" - the girl stared at the witch. The whole look of the woman said that she was experiencing indescribable horror.  
Glados nodded with difficulty. Her hands shook.  
The princess herself could no longer bear this sight.  
"Hey! Shoo!" - the girl swung a branch at the bird, trying to move so that the troublemaker did not think of flying to the spruces, to Glados. The crow croaked displeased, but deigned to jump out of the grass and run a few meters from the fir trees. The witch immediately jumped out from behind the trees and hid behind the princess's back.  
"Drive it away completely!" - demanded the woman a little livelier. Chell nodded and shouted: "Shoo! Shoo! Out!". She began to beat on the grass near the bird.  
The crow was indignant a little more that it had been driven away from a warm place, but in the end it heavily flapped its wings and flew away.

Chell dropped the stick, twisted her tired hand and looked back at the witch. The woman gazed after the flying bird. Glados's fingers tightly squeezed the shoulders of the princess, and she herself clung to the girl's back as if she wanted to hide.  
"Miss Glados?.." - hesitantly called Chell. The witch took a deep breath several times, struggled to pull herself together and unstuck from the girl, still continuing to stay close enough.  
"If you ask at least one question, I’ll kill you", - hissed a witch. Her face was distorted by barely restrained suffering. - "Oh, Gods. Why did I deserve all this?"  
"I can go ahead and drive the birds away", - Chell bent to pick up the stick, but Glados grabbed her by the bandaged elbow.  
"No. I have lost the desire to replenish supplies today. Instead, it will be necessary to take care of these... These... _Creatures_. Gods. I poisoned them all!"  
"Do not be afraid, I will not ask anything and I will drive away the crows, if necessary", - Chell smiled. The witch looked ominously into her eyes, but did not find a shadow of ridicule, and muttered, puzzled:  
"O... Okay. We change the plan, in general. We will return to the house and mix... Something. From the birds. But you have to drive away all the birds, you! And at least one extra word, and..."  
Chell suddenly grabbed Glados by the hand, pressed it to her chest and exclaimed warmly: "I swear to all Gods, miss! If I allow myself even one nod in this direction - you can kill me immediately!"  
"Excessive pathos", - the woman pulled out her hand and grabbed the princess by the elbow again. Nevertheless, Glados looked much calmer and more happy. - "We are not in some cheap novel. Just drive all the birds away from me. And I, so be it, will show you a couple more tricks from my arsenal..."  
The woman gripped Chell's elbow more firmly, extended her hand in front of her and whispered inaudibly. The witch's palm lit up in orange, and Glados quickly drew an even long oval with this glow.  
The princess opened her mouth in amazement - not the trees were visible in the oval, but the interior of the Glados house.  
The witch pushed the girl into an oval and followed her.

***

The princess admiredly looked at the frame of the portal, while Glados conjured her own hand in the white glow. From the side of the house, the portal shone in blue.  
"How do you do this?" - Chell asked breathlessly. The witch, inside her own home completely regained her composure, casually shrugged.  
"I own magic, stupid. The answer to your question is so obvious that even such a short-sighted person should guess".  
"I mean..." - the girl waved her hand, unable to convey in words her delight. - "This is... Just unbelievable! Damn great!"  
"This is usual portal", - Glados snorted, turning her back to the princess to hide the quivering corners of her lips. The woman touched the oval frame, and the portal disappeared into thin air. - "Not the most skilled magic, you know. But not the easiest, this is also true. Sometimes I use it if I wander very far from home, or the collection is big... And why are you chatting at all? Remove from the table the bread box and the salt shaker and the bed over that white tablecloth, I will teach you small useful things!"  
Chell obediently obeyed the orders of Glados and set the dining table with a strange-looking tablecloth. Its fabric amusedly stretched and immediately regained its shape, but otherwise it looked more like paper. The witch put on the table several jars filled with gray powder, clogged bottles, a bunch of unknown dried grass and several signed boxes, such as the one in which the girl herself was picking ezloi berries.  
"I’ll do everything, and you just give me the ingredients I need, okay?" - Glados placed the bottles on the side of the table, which was not lit by the sun. - "These are dried and shredded ezloi spikes. Try so that the powder does not get on your skin if you do not want to earn an expressive burn".  
The girl readily pulled a shirt sleeve over her healthy hand. The witch grinned.  
"Okay... First of all, bring some water". 


	8. Scarecrow

Armed with a knife and a bag over her shoulder, Chell climbed onto a tree that the witch showed her. After another treatment with ointment, the injured hand obeyed almost the same way as before meeting with ezloi spikes. In addition, the princess finally came in handy the tree climbing skill that she learned in the royal garden because of the greatest boredom.  
"There's nothing there?" - Glados put a hand to her eyes.  
"Well, here, it seems, the remains of straw and twigs", - Chell answered, looking at something resting among the branches of the crown. "Something" was a bird's nest, falling apart from time, weather conditions and lack of care.  
"This is not a whole nest?" - Glados asked. - "Oh, that's great. But pour it anyway".  
The princess hooked on the strongest branch with her healthy hand and took a vial of pale red liquid from her bag. In just forty minutes spent at the table, the witch mixed potions into forty-two such vials. The woman accompanied the entire cooking process with witty comments, so Chell felt more like a chef's helper in the kitchen, who was taught to cook some kind of complicated soup.  
The girl pulled out a small cork with her fingernail and poured the contents of the vial onto the remains of the nest. The liquid hissed and soaked into the bark of a tree.  
"Is it done? Then get down until you poison yourself with vapor", - the witch impatiently crossed her arms over her chest.

"So, this thing will poison all the birds in the area?" - Chell wiped her hands with the alcohol-damped handkerchief that the witch had given her.  
"It will only scare them away", - Glados shook her head. - "Well ... That is, maybe it will poison them, but at the same time it will scare them away from my forest. As if I want them to fly to die in my garden! I’ve already relaxed, you see, for a long time there were no birds here... Damn them!"  
"You can put a scarecrow, you have a wind there sometimes", - the princess uttered thoughtfully. - "I can do this".  
"You can do this later", - Glados winced and put a hand to her forehead. In a couple of hours, they found about thirty abandoned nests, and, to the witch's horror, seven completely new ones, albeit without eggs. The princess poured poison on them, but still the woman did not feel calmer - only more tired than usual. - "We should... We should still sprinkle the garden... With something".  
She sighed and involuntarily leaned on the girl's shoulder. Chell readily offered her hand.  
"Let's go home already... to your home, that is. I’ll do everything myself, you just tell me what to do".  
Glados nodded, feeling terribly tired and most of all now wanting to wrap herself in a blanket and not go out for at least a week. Chell carefully brought her home, in the house she put the witch on a chair and stood respectfully five steps from her. The witch, with apparent displeasure, thought that it would not be worth giving the girl to remember the path, but nothing could be done here.  
"Maybe some tea?" - suggested the girl. Glados shrugged.  
"Take water into the teapot and put it into the stove".  
The girl obediently ran to the barrel with a beautiful teapot painted with lilies and stopped indecisively near the stove damper.  
"I, um..." - she looked back at the woman.  
"What, are you finally afraid to get burned?" - Glados grinned. - "Do not be afraid. I have not used firewood for a long time".  
A little encouraged and intrigued, Chell opened the shutter, which, contrary to expectations, turned out to be a little warm. Behind it, a bright orange flame burned evenly, and it burned on the clean bottom of the stove, without any visible fuel.  
"Wow!" - the girl timidly brought her hand to the fire. The flame gently licked Chell's fingers, dousing them with incredible, but not burning heat. The princess held her breath and set the teapot right in the middle of the fire.  
"This fire is magical, but do not get carried away with it anyway", - the witch called her. Chell sat on the opposite chair, still bewitched by the fire. - "I suppose you will also ask about fire, how did I do this?"  
"But after all... But after all, a very faint smoke comes from the chimney at your house", - the girl remembered. The witch nodded.  
"Just because it is magical. Pay attention to the bottom of the stove", - Chell looked inside again - the whole bottom, where the tongues of fire danced, occupied a large complex drawing in red chalk. - "Do not even ask how difficult it was to paint all this... By the way, for this reason - do not even think to extinguish this fire with water. If you wash off the chalk, I will force you to redraw it".

The teapot whistled. Chell quickly pulled it out of the stove and set it on the table. Glados wearily sat back in her chair, lazily watching the girl's actions. It turns out that the princess remembered where the owner of the house had supplies, where are the cups, where are the spoons, and so on. At other times, Glados would have been indignant, but now she was even a little pleased that she was being looked after. Otherwise, she would have to fumble on the shelves herself, go for water, move a chair to get tea leaves...  
However, a woman would not have to stand on a chair. Glados grinned, a little more intently than it would have been worth while peering at the small, well-built princess. The witch had already noticed, of course, that the girl was lower than her, and for some reason she suddenly felt tender for her. And then she got mad at it.  
"No sugar", - she remarked coldly, picking up a cup of freshly brewed tea leaf. Chell did not dare to put sugar in her cup, and therefore froze in front of the table with a cup of hot tea. So they spent some time silently sipping tea and listening to the ticking of the clock.  
"So what should I do?" - Chell set aside her empty cup and readily rolled up her sleeve. Glados lazily pointed to the chest.  
"Jar. "Birds". Gloves are nearby, be sure to take. When it is absorbed into the ground, it will be already harmless to humans, and before that it is better to limit contact with the skin. Fill each bed around the perimeter, and generally around the house".

The princess carefully watered the soil near the witch’s house, the earth around the beds, spilled a little near the sunflowers, and even shook out the remaining liquid near the ezloi bush. She looked around, wondering if everything had been done, and frowned. Behind the lake, a dark bird flock flew up somewhere and headed towards the city.  
"She definitely needs a scarecrow", - muttered Chell thoughtfully, looking from the bird flock to the window of the house, which she painted herself. The princess remembered horrified golden eyes and hurried back to the house.  
"Are you done already?" - Glados was lying on the stove, wrapped in a blanket with her head so that the girl could see only a glance dull from fatigue. Chell nodded. - "Leave the jar in the corner, I will remove it later. Well... I do not have any tasks for you yet. I am tired".  
"It's only five o'clock now", - the girl glanced at grandfather closk. Again they were ticking barely audibly, surprisingly tactfully. - "I can still make a scarecrow. At least try".  
"Try", - Glados shrugged and buried her face in the pillow. - "You will find sticks in the forest. You can keep the knife for yourself for now".  
"Can’t I take a broom?" - for the first time, Chell drew attention to an unusually groomed broom standing in the darkest corner behind the stove. The broomstick did not have a single extra splinter, and all the black twigs seemed to be neatly combed.  
"No, you can not", - snapped out the witch. - "It is mine. Go and find some extra sticks in the woods, since you had the urge to needlework".

Chell picked up a pile of more or less long and strong branches in the forest and trimmed them with a knife as much as she could. Then she dragged the branches to the Glados' site and thought about how to fit the branches to each other. The most obvious decision was to somehow tie the shorter stick to the stick crosswise and fasten some clothes onto it. But the girl was afraid to disturb the witch, and she had to manage in her work what was at hand.  
"Done", - she returned to the house and immediately ducked under the upper cloak on her bed. The witch, having already rested a little, hung her bare feet from the stove and looked in bewilderment at the princess.  
"Are you tired already?" - she grinned. Chell shook her head vaguely. Glados gracefully jumped to the floor and headed out into the yard.  
The scarecrow looked not so bad. Although the girl did not manage to fix the cross-stick evenly, and one sleeve of the shirt shot up above the other, and the hat was not deep enough to stay normally on the top of the branch, but in general it was...  
"Wait a minute!" - the woman grabbed a scarecrow by the sleeve. Where did the girl get the shirt from? She didn’t ask Glados for any rags!  
The witch suddenly was dawned. Against her will, her lips extended into a smile, and Glados had to bite her knuckles, to not to laugh.  
"Such a fool!" - the witch unfastened several buttons on the scarecrow's shirt and with some delight saw that the cross-base branches were tied up with white stockings. Glados finally allowed herself to laugh. - "Oh, for Gods' sake! Even put her hat on it!"  
Chell hid her nose under the cloak, with an embarrassed smile, listening to the witch's laugh. She was terribly ashamed to appear half-naked, but at the same time she was pleased that the woman liked her work.  
"Do you know who you are?" - Glados grinned from the doorway and threw the pointed hat at the princess. - "You are the living embodiment of the proverb "give away the last shirt". And fool, for Gods' sake! Why not ask me for some sweater or dress, at worst?"  
"I didn’t want to bother you", - muttered Chell, blushing terribly and rejoicing that only the upper part of her face was now visible. The witch put her hand to her face, never ceasing to smile.  
"Fool", - the woman said almost affectionately. She fished out a faded, but rather tolerable gray shirt from the bottom of the chest and dropped it on Chell's head. - "Get dressed, monster. You built it - you will set it. Only this time I will look after you".


	9. Hunting

Thursday morning began much calmer. The witch and the princess were awakened by a measured, delicate clock chime. They stretched almost equally, yawned in the palm of their hand, and sat on their beds.  
"Water", - peacefully asked rather than demanded Glados. Chell jumped up briskly, reached out with a flick of a snap, and ran out of the house with a teapot.  
The witch glanced out the window, squinting from the low morning sun.  
Her soul was unusually calm. Surprisingly, some time ago, she could not even think about how to feel comfortable next to another human being... But the girl for some reason did not cause such a rejection, as in their first meeting. But only a couple of days have passed!  
"It's okay, as soon as she reaches the end, she will leave", - Glados nodded to herself and slid down from bed.

"Do you always wear this dress?" - Chell suddenly asked during breakfast. The witch woke up from a strange thoughtfulness that gripped her, glanced at her dress and raised a neat thin eyebrow.  
"What do you think is wrong with it?"  
"No, it's just that I’ve been here the third day, and you... Are you sleeping in it too?.."  
Glados silently led the girl to the chest, tapped the lid and opened it. Instead of the cloaks that remained there, several cans, work gloves and tools that Chell had seen yesterday, inside were a variety of neatly folded clothes - including several almost identical black dresses, trousers and shirts.  
"Where do you think I got the replacement for your shirt?" - Glados casually slammed the lid of the chest. - "There are tools in that compartment of the chest. This is a wardrobe. There are a couple more with everything that necessary. And yes, this is also part of the wonderful magic that you constantly admire. Spatial, akin to my portals".  
"Nice", - Chell nodded. - "May I wash the dishes?"  
"May you?" - the witch smiled. - "Well, if you do not break anything, you can try. I suppose I need to teach you this too?"  
"No, miss, I saw clean plates in the palace", - the girl allowed herself a reciprocal grin. - "The lake?.."  
"Um... No, why in the lake. The lake is easy to pollute like that. Let's go to the river".

On this side of the lake, all the rivers flowed from it. This woman knew for sure. Therefore, after breakfast, they simply headed along the coast, enjoying the warm morning sun.  
The girl carried a basin with dishes and a pair of sponges. Due to the current lack of stockings and the example of Glados, she took off her boots without hesitation and went barefoot, which she soon regretted because of lack of habit. Stones mixed with earth and roots turned out to be an overly cruel test for the delicate feet of the princess, who had never before walked completely barefoot.  
"Fool", - the witch addressed to her in a very neutral tone, stopping, - "maybe you’ll come back and put on your boots? Without stockings, it may not be so convenient, but I also do not want to spend the healing ointment on your legs either".  
"N-no, it's ok-kay", - Chell smiled cheerfully, trying to make her knees not tremble at every step. Because of really small pebbles on her feet appeared scratches, each of which the princess felt too painfully, as it seemed to her.  
The witch only shook her head and went slower.

Finally they went to the mouth of the river. Walking a little further down the river, Glados ordered Chell to put a basin in the grass and sit down.  
"Sit? I'm not..." - the woman unceremoniously pushed the princess into the grass and, with her characteristic grace, sat next to her. The witch touched Chell's barely bleeding foot and frowned.  
"What a... klutz, huh..." - Glados rose and with a gesture ordered the princess who had begun to rise, to stay in that position. - "I said boots! It’s not for your princess’s feet to roam the bare earth".  
"But you go barefoot all the time!" - protested the girl, held in a sitting position only by the imperious gesture of the witch. - "And this is normal for you!"  
"I used to walk barefoot", - Glados grinned. In this movement of the lips and expression of the woman's eyes, the princess thought something heavy and unkind. - "It’s as if you are intentionally trying to attract trouble! What kind of girl, huh? So... Feet into the water, fast".  
Chell only bit her lip like an offended child, but heroically remained silent and lowered her feet into the water. From the coolness, her legs began to tighten, and the girl’s first impulse was to pull them out of the water, but she endured.  
"Sit like that", - Glados pushed the basin toward the river and knelt. - "You clearly want to earn blood poisoning. What is it, your inner tendency to self-destruction?"  
"I just wanted to go barefoot", - Chell squinted at the witch. She grinned and handed the princess a sponge and a cup dark from tea.  
"She wanted to. If you want something, this does not mean that it is good".  
The woman took a deep bowl, dipped the dish in the water and began to wash off the remnants of their dinner with a second sponge. Chell followed suit, though not so skillfully, but very diligently. Glados put clean dishes one on the other on the grass.  
The long sleeves of the witch's dress, covering her hand to the palm of her hand, got wet and irritated her with a cold wet cloth. But she terribly did not want to roll up her sleeve, so she had to endure.  
"Rub, rub", - Glados commanded, despite the fact that the princess didn’t fly away. - "The future queen or future laundress, some life skills must be".  
"I would rather be the future laundress", - Chell frowned thoughtfully. The witch cast a quick, incomprehensible look at her, but was silent.

When the dishes were washed and plunged back into the basin, the woman began to think about how to bring the princess back to her house. There was no question that the girl would walk on foot - her feet had just stopped bleeding, and although Chell herself insisted that she could bypass even the whole forest in such a manner, Glados merely brushed aside with annoyance.  
"Better sit and do not argue. Blood poisoning has never made anyone more handsome", - the witch looked again at the injured feet. Chell had a strong desire to tighten her legs, but for this one could provoke the anger of her commander... Again. - "Not a portal, of course. For two, it takes something too much energy... And I can not call a broom from here. Why are you such a troublemaker, huh?"  
The girl brought her shoulders uncomfortably and looked down. Glados shook her head.  
"Good. I will bring something and your boots in addition. You sit and watch the basin. And do not get up, for Gods' sake, while you have not hurt yourself once more!"  
The witch shook the hem from the grass and disappeared into the forest.

For a while, Chell looked at the flowing water. The river ran slowly, crossing over several large stones in the middle and slightly foaming around them. The sun warmed the feet frozen in the water, and the pain gradually dulled.  
Chell sighed, stretched her legs and lay down in the grass. With nothing to do, she thought of a witch, this strange, random acquaintance. It seems that Glados began to treat her a little better - in any case, compared with the same Tuesday, when the woman allowed Chell to be poisoned with thorns.Or was it a feeling of gratitude for the birds?..  
The princess did not understand what the small harmless birds could do to experience such horror in front of them that was reflected on Glados' face. But at the same time, Chell felt a strong desire to protect her random benefactress from them. Even though the curse has to be removed. Well then? The whole evening of Monday, the princess did not feel the oppressive need to _choose_ \- is this not enough to be thankful?  
And not everyone should always be lucky. It was her lucky parents that they fell in love with each other before the wedding...  
"Ahead of us is the river, Your Highness", - suddenly came nearby. It was someone very familiar. - "Would you like to have a rest?"  
"I would", - Wheatley sighed wearily. Chell flinched - this thin, with eternal hidden discontent voice she would recognize anywhere! And she really would not want to.  
Footsteps and quiet swearing were heard. Someone was wading through bushes and densely woven tree branches.  
Chell gritted her teeth so as not to accidentally groan, crawled into the tall bushes, lay there and froze, legs crossed and sincerely hoping to be unnoticed. A dry branch unpleasantly rested against her side, but the princess was afraid to move.  
From here, she could see part of the place where the basin stood with clean dishes. After a few minutes, those whom she expected but didn’t want to see appeared. These were Prince Wheatley and the old huntsman. The huntsman was one of those who led rare royal hunts, in which Chell herself participated several times, albeit as an observer. Both men had guns dangling over their shoulders, and Wheatley seemed especially small compared to his gun, just like compared to his own clothes.  
The girl resisted a scornful snort and held her breath.  
"What kind of garbage is this?" - Whitley bent over the basin with the dishes. Chell saw part of his squeamishly wrinkled face. - "Do dishwashers live here?"  
"Some peasant woman left this", - the huntsman responded melancholy. - "Leave this, Your Highness, why do you need someone else's dirty dishes? The owner will return and pick it up".  
Wheatley frowned. His appearance expressed dissatisfaction at least with the whole world.  
"It would be nice if Monday came faster!" - he poked a side of the basin with the toe of his boot in frustration. - "I'm terribly tired to gad around!"  
"Her Highness will soon return from aunt, do not worry", - the huntsman still calmly noticed, listening to some rustle. - "Do you really think that at court there is a better candidate than you, my lord?"  
"Of course not!" - Wheatley smirked smugly, pulling a sling gun belt over his shoulder. - "It is a pity that your princess herself does not deign to understand this. She apparently wants to remain a spinster, huh?"  
"I will refrain from answering this, my lord", - the huntsman turned away, as if looking out for something in the forest. To the great pleasure of the princess, the old man rolled his eyes and sighed inaudibly. Surely he himself was terribly tired of the "best candidate" company.

"And why is it so crowded in this forest?" - Chell's heart beat faster. Glados returned to the river with a basket and now had her back to princess, but her gaze probably expressed dissatisfaction. Wheatley was a little bewildered, and the old huntsman bowed politely.  
"Good day, miss! His Highness and I accidentally found your sweet basin and stayed by so that no one would steal it. Here you are, and here we are leaving".  
"Hurry, please", - the witch nodded coldly. She could not see Chell, but nevertheless she stood right in front of the bush, where the princess was hiding, as if not to let random strangers in this direction.  
"Excuse me, you probably did not recognize Us", - Wheatley raised his voice, judging by his tone moving to the royal "we". - "Wheatleybald Stampian. Prince".  
"Wait, "prince" are both of you?" - Glados grinned. The girl buried her face in the ground so as not to laugh out loud.  
"Who are both?" - Wheatley was confused.  
"You said "did not recognize us", - Glados crossed her arms over her chest. - "I know neither you, boy, nor the gentleman accompanying you".  
"Boy?!" - Wheatley's tone rose and ran into their ears with a squeak. The princess frowned. - "Do you know who you're talking to, peasant?!"  
"My lord, be reasonable!" - the huntsman tried to grab the prince by the hand, but Wheatley jerked, and the old man clung to the barrel of his gun. - "Do not quarrel with the loyal subjects of my king! Obviously, this woman is not alright!"  
"Do not protect me from this ill-bred youth", - Glados answered calmly and averted her hand. Blue sparks running along her long, thin fingers resembled those that preceded the curse for Chell. Judging by the fact that the ranger and Wheatley fell silent, they also noticed this. - "Come to my forest. Breaking my bushes. Kicking my basin. Do you think I did not notice the boot mark over there on the side? I just cleaned my utensils, so now I have to do it again? Are you suggesting this to me, important bump?"  
It seemed to Chell that the sky above them darkened.  
"I-I!.." - Wheatley tried to save face in front of the stranger, but the witch abruptly stepped forward and raised her hand. From blue sparks in the palm of the hand a ball flashed, swirling strangely broken flashes and buzzing.  
"You?" - under the cold calm, anger rumbled in Glados's voice. - "Have you heard of lightning, I guess? Do you know what will remain of your pompous physiognomy if I push you into the water before a strike?"  
The huntsman did not wait for Wheatley's next disconcerting answer - there was a thud, and then a rustle and a soft knock. The old man shouldered the frail prince, incapacitated by the butt of his gun. The huntsman hung Wheatley's weapon on his second shoulder.  
"We're sorry to bother you", - the old man nodded with restraint and, unusually easy for a man of his age, went away with his unconscious ward on his shoulder.


	10. Scars

The witch snapped her fingers, and the clot of energy instantly went out.  
"And what was that, let me ask?" - Glados stared probingly at Chell crawling out of the bush. - "Why do I again find you in a more deplorable state than you were before I left?"  
"Well..." - the girl took out several leaves and twigs from her hair. - "This is one of... My... "grooms".  
" _This?!_ " - Glados was horrified with disgust. - " _This_ is even a paralyzed deaf-blind crone will not want to see as her husband!"  
"I don't want either! He himself wants to come to us", - the princess examined herself. Her shirt and pants were stained with traces of leaves and earth, in several places the fabric was torn because of branches... - "I really didn’t want to face him".  
"I believe you", - the woman's voice softened. - "His face shows that he is a moron. But now look at yourself, monster!"  
The witch threw a basket at her. A jar of ointment, clean bandages and Chell's boots were found under a gray towel.  
"Go on, go on, do it yourself", - the woman commented. - "Or do I need to teach you how to handle scratches?"  
The princess shook her head and crawled to the river to wash the scratches again. The witch stood half-sided, squinting at the back of a wounded gray shirt and the movement of the girl's shoulders.  
The witch actually did not plan to protect her, and maybe if this pompous dummy took the girl back to the palace, for Glados it would be better...  
The hand in which there used to be ball lightning suddenly ached terribly. The woman bit her lip, turned away from Chell, and quickly rolled up her sleeve. The witch's left arm, starting from the wrist, was disfigured by traces of old, but terrible burns. All the old scars suddenly appeared with extraordinary sharpness, and for some reason veins became visible... The lack of constant practice affected - Glados preferred to engage in herbalism, especially poisons, rather than practical magic. And she was proud of herself, no matter what people thought of the real witches.  
"Oh, Gods!" - blurted Chell. The witch quickly lowered her sleeve and spun around, hiding her arm behind her back. While the woman was thinking, the princess had already treated the legs with ointment, bandaged them with bandages, put them in boots and stood up to say that she was ready, and... - "Wh... Who did this to you?"  
The girl's voice was full of righteous anger and a bit of regret. The woman frowned severely.  
"It's none of your business, girl. Done?"  
"Listen, I didn’t ask about birds, I didn’t ask about feet, but this!.." - Chell's hands involuntarily clenched into fists and shook. Has she never seen scars worse than a scratch from a branch? But damn it, in addition to being angry at interfering in the personal life of Glados, it was so flattering! Princess, a miserable bargaining chip in political games, from which the witch was infinitely far away - felt sorry for her! It was definitely an odd princess.  
"Be content that those who did this are dead", - Glados answered almost without opening her lips and grabbed the basket. - "Are you ready? Take a basin".

***

Only a barely noticeable scattering of blue dots on the girl’s hand reminded of the poisoning. The dots looked like drops of diluted ink. Ironically, the left arm was injured - Glados even smiled sadly and mechanically took hold of her own left wrist.  
"What will we do now?" - Chell stood by the table, rubbing her bandage-free hand. The girl’s gaze wandered around the room, not stopping at anything and carefully avoiding the witch’s hands.  
"I will go about my business, and you will do the mending of clothes", - Glados put a thread and a needle in the girl's hands. - "I hope you did not think that I would let you get my shirt back in that condition? Look how many holes you left from climbing in the bushes".  
With these words, without saying goodbye, the woman went to the door, taking a broom along the way. Chell watched the witch with a sad look from the window and saw the witch letting go of the broom, and the broom lay softly on the air, as if on a flat surface. Glados sat on a broom, elegantly dangling her legs to the side, and slowly flew over the lake.  
The princess pulled off her shirt, sat down at the table, closer to the window, and began to work.

Things did not go very fast, because suturing small holes required much more skill than brushing. For the first half hour of work, the girl pricked her fingers about ten times, and the holes in the shirt did not end. As soon as she sews a sleeve, when there is a hole at the collar, she sews it in, so a tiny gap in the hem appears!  
An hour later, the princess was already rippling in her eyes from the abundance of holes in the shirt. The clothes seemed to mock Chell and itself cracked in new places. "I'll never climb into the bushes again!" - the princess swore to herself, sticking her punctured fingers into her mouth and looking at the shirt in frustration. Here, another small hole near the collar! But the girl could have sworn that she had just sewn five exactly the same!  
"Damn it!" - angry, Chell decided to stop. She bit a thread and put on a shirt. On the body, the remnants of holes did not seem to be so noticeable, so the princess calmed down a little.  
Having decided not to engage in sewing again in her life (at least without the order or help of Glados), the girl looked around the room in search of a new business. She was bored of sitting idle, and the witch apparently hoped that the fuss with the shirt would occupy the girl until her return.  
Chell's gaze fell on the edge of the mattress lying on the stove. Definitely Glados liked sleeping on the soft...  
She walked over and touched the mattress. And it was really soft!

Then the girl, bravely, pulled a chair to the stove and stood on it - from the height of her growth, the Glados' bed was not very convenient to look at.  
First of all, she saw a bouquet of lilies of the valley wrapped in fabric and lying near the wall. The flowers were already slightly faded, but, leaning forward, Chell caught a faint delicate smell. However, this fragrance was immediately interrupted by a smell that was already familiar to the girl, but before that it was poorly distinguishable. It could not be clearly described, but this smell caused a sweet pulling feeling in the chest and made the princess smile. So the whole bed smelled, raincoats (albeit weaker), the wall of each jar in the house, and even a little lily of the valley.  
It was the smell of Glados.  
Chell got goosebumps on her back. She closed her eyes and buried her face in the pillow, guided by a sudden impulse. The smell seemed so oddly cozy, unexpectedly familiar, as if intoxicating. The princess smiled a little absent-mindedly and rubbed her nose against the pillow, like an affectionate cat on the leg of her beloved master.  
"Gods almighty..." - the girl hardly looked up from the pillow, squinting and trying to figure out what she was doing.  
Chell shook her head several times, stepping out of the dope enveloping her. She quickly straightened the pillow and blanket, put the chair back in place, and began to walk around the house, glancing at the grandfather clock. The clock hands ticked almost inaudibly, as if not wanting to distract the guest from thoughts.  
The girl suddenly remembered that it was already Thursday. Friday, Saturday, Sunday - only three more days, and she will have to return to eternal dresses in public, to a huge crowd of grooms, to the _choice_!.. The princess became so sad that she moaned and clutched her head. Glados may have been a sarcastic and arrogant interlocutor, but she was so incomparably better!  
"I will never return to her later", - the princess thought sadly. No, she did not think that the witch would even make friends with her (at the thought of something further, Chell was breathless), but she could not help but notice that the woman was treating her a little better than the day before.  
Driven by boredom and rolling longing, the girl walked to the copper-bound witch's chest. She suddenly really wanted to take something from this house as a memento, since she probably would not have to come back here. Chell carefully pushed the lid back - Glados left the section with her clothes open, to the delight of the princess.  
The girl looked out the window to make sure that the woman was not yet returning, cast a quick glance at the grandfather clock and rushed to the chest.


	11. Sugar

Having flown a little over the lake, quite a bit with pleasure touching warm water with the tips of her toes, Glados finally directed her broom slightly higher. She kept her way to the other side of the lake, to one of the large distant villages - at dinner it turned out that she had run out of meat, and if not for the sake of a guest, then at least it was worth buying food for herself. Especially since Glados had some trump cards in her sleeve to keep incognito.  
Having flown under the canopy of trees, the woman dismounted, walked a little and hid the broom in the dense thickets of wild rose. Then she took the basket, deftly tied her head with a modest black scarf, wrapped her legs in dark bandages, pressed her lips sternly and headed toward the side from which misanthropy averted her.

A black-clad figure appeared on a wide country road. Even the merchants did not really remember the face of this woman, but these common features were familiar to everyone - and everyone the woman passed by was hushed up in praising their goods. The woman stopped at a butcher's shop, looking with fiery eyes at the pieces of meat laid out on the counter.  
The shopkeeper turned pale from the strange cold that blew from this silent figure. Everyone knew a mysterious mute woman, they knew that sometimes she came to buy something, but no one could say anything definite about her.  
"Would you like some meat?" - the shopkeeper smiled faintly, rather from fear than from a desire to sell her anything. The man was frightened by the fact that no matter how much he peered into the strict pale face of a woman, he did not succeed in grasping his features and uniting them together. Only eyes, eyes of fire were imprinted in memory, and it was worse to catch their sight than a bullet or arrow.  
Glados, who very successfully managed to play muteness to limit communication with people, carefully felt several pieces of beef and pointed to the best three.  
"Um... Um... F-four silver", - muttered the shopkeeper, experiencing a terrible desire to pull off his hat. The woman nodded, framed the basket and held out four silver thalers. The shopkeeper looked at each coin, tried it on the tooth, nodded respectfully and wrapped pieces of meat in brown wrapping paper. Such a paper relied on him only to the most respected customers... Or to those to whom he wanted to show his respect.

The witch bought fresh fish, apples and pepper, which for some reason stubbornly did not want to grow in her garden. After walking through the rows a couple more times and not finding anything else useful, Glados moved to the exit of the village, when suddenly a crowd of children and teenagers drew her attention, animatedly jabbering in the middle of the street. Actually, they attracted her just by blocking the passage.  
The entire free younger population of the village crowded around a man with a portable tray. Looking at the hawker, Glados thought that he was not local and was not going to stay for a long time, but the man smiled merrily at others and periodically shouted laudatory speeches to his goods.  
"The sweetest candies!" - Glados heard. - "Look what a beauty! Sugar cockerels, caramel canes, painted gingerbread cookies! Cheap, every is cheaper than a silver coin!"  
The woman slowed down. A pile of sweets really rose in the man’s tray - ordinary burnt sugar, with some natural colors, some even broken, but the kids did not detract from the enthusiasm. They paid even more attention to caramels than to the neater gingerbread cookies in the shape of horses and little men with yellow and white icing lying nearby.  
"Burnt sugar for children is like opium", - the witch snorted, but stopped. In fact, she herself would not mind the sweet... Not these stupid caramels, of course, but the gingerbreads to her taste looked very pretty.  
She resolutely moved to the children. They felt the approach of "mute", all at once turned their heads and silently parted. Those who had enough coins for some piece of caramel immediately ran away.  
"Oh lovely lady!" - hawker grinned and straightened. - "Choose a candy for yourself or your lovely child?"  
Glados pointed a hand at herself and meticulously fingered the gingerbread horse with white glaze mane, hooves and eyes. The dough looked well baked.  
"Are you a sweet tooth, honey?" - the hawker shone, apparently not noticing the witch's contemptuously squinting eyes. - "Why are you so silent, lady?"  
"Lady" tapped the edge of an inclined palm on her lips. The man shook his head.  
"And what does that mean?.. Mute, or what?"  
Glados nodded, giving him the coldest of her sights. This time, the hawker paid attention to this and even flinched, to the witch's pleasure, although he hastened to hide the confusion with pretense of gaiety.  
"Ah, what a pity! Well, I will not distract you, choose calmly, everything is cheap, tasty..."  
The witch made him shut up with a gesture, and thought, looking at the broken caramels and listening to the whispers of the children behind her. Gods, she herself has a big child at home now...  
"Why would you think that?" - Glados instantly scowled at herself. The princess is not her pal, not even a friend, and she will not spend her money on it - that’s it!  
"Mute" picked up the gingerbread she liked and looked inquiringly at the seller.  
"Only eighteen copper coins, lady", - the merchant hastily broke into another smile. Glados poured a handful of copper into his wallet and quickly walked away.  
After twenty steps she slowed down, after another ten she thought, the next five - she looked back at the hawker, distracted by the kids. The face of Glados expressed an internal struggle, she frowned and bit her lip angrily, even a few blue sparks broke from her fingers...  
"Huh?" - the hawker turned and recoiled - the witch's eyes gleamed ominously. It seemed to him that she could kill with just one look. - "Ye... Y-yes, yes, dear lady? Do you want anything else?"  
Glados exhaled loudly and poked her finger at the most whole candy - a yellow-red caramel cane, very small, fit in the palm of her hand.  
"Half a lingonberry juice? Of course, of course, as you say, madame", - the hawker’s voice sat down a little in fear, - "this one is even cheaper, only nine... No, no, five, five copper, just for you!"  
Glados threw the money on the tray with force, grabbed this unfortunate caramel and rushed into the forest with a whirlwind.

***

"My house is intact!" - Glados proclaimed, stepping over the threshold. She let go of the broom, and it itself took its dark corner. - "Wow, but I already expected that your love of killing yourself will spread to... Well, what are you doing again?"  
Chell, sitting at the table, somehow looked up from the book in front of her. It was a heavy old leather-bound volume with yellowed pages and frayed edges - more because they were often turned over than from old age.  
"I'm here... I read", - the girl smiled lost. Her thoughts, apparently, were far, far away.  
"I see. My book. Do you know how expensive books are today for mere mortals?" - the witch tapped the lid of the chest and threw it open. It smelled of frost inside. Glados hurriedly threw back the meat in brown paper and slammed the lid.  
"I read neatly", - Chell closed the book and shook her head. - "Somehow strange... It seems I read, and it’s interesting, but it’s not very clear what exactly..."  
"This is a book about alchemical signs", - Glados gently removed the princess's hand from the cover and put the book down on the shelf. - "Firstly, it’s too complicated for you, you’ve never been an alchemist. But yes, it is truly splendidly written. Secondly, you were not taught not to touch other people's things? Even if these are books! _Especially_ if these are books. Have you already sewn up all the holes on my shirt?"  
"Seems yes", - Chell stood up and extended her arms in front of her so that the witch would glance at her work. Glados absentmindedly examined the shirt and fixed her gaze on the pricked fingers of the princess. The girl quickly turned her palms down, but the woman already scornfully scoffed her tongue.  
"Minor injuries. Again. I get the impression that if you were left alone in the castle even for a day, you would find a way to choke on a hairpin or accidentally break your neck when going down the stairs".  
"This is a very delicate work", - protested Chell, - "I still did not learn this!"  
"You did not?" - Glados stuck a needle, which the girl very hindly left just to lie on the table, in the needle bar and put away. - "It seems that aristocratic girls are taught different ways of embroidery and sewing, am I wrong?"  
"W-well..." - the princess looked down. - "They teach. This does not mean that I must certainly learn this!"  
"So you should send a complaint to the Gods that you were given a female body, not a male", - the witch grunted. - "As I see it, you just have to pull something heavy and get hurt. Isn't that boyish behavior?"  
"I like everything about me!" - for some reason, Chell blushed thickly and crossed her arms over her chest, hiding her palms under her arms. The woman was intrigued by such a reaction, and with a grin she put a finger on the girl's chin, forcing her to raise her face.  
"Oh, just do not tell me that such a stubborn brave girl has complexes about her appearance. I suppose you choose dresses with a long hem not because it is as convenient as for me, but to hide a couple of extra kilos on the hips?"  
The girl rolled her eyes, but the witch noticed how the slightly plump lips of the crown princess flinched. The longer Glados looked at them, the less she wanted to let go of any joke about Chell's figure.  
"Wait, wait", - the witch grunted, pretended to have a tickle in her throat, and removed her finger from the girl's chin. - "Even such a naive fool should understand that I am joking. Your legs are perfectly visible in the pants. Everything is fine with them".  
Chell nodded, breathing often and squinting, as if she were about to really cry. " _What's wrong with her?_ " - Glados indeed coughed into her fist several times and pointed to the door.  
"Oh, look, did not you wash the earth off your face? I won’t let you go to the table like that!"  
The princess nodded gratefully and ran out of the house, head down. The witch sat up, surprised to listen to her own heart beat faster at the sight of the girl's trembling lips.

Chell returned reddened and with a face shining from the water, but much calmer. Glados had already made tea by that time and had even added a small sugar bowl and a copper spoon to it - unobtrusively, from the side of the table where the princess was supposed to sit. The witch herself did not like sweet tea.  
"You surprisingly infuriate me a little in comparison with the beginning of our acquaintance", - said the woman, bringing the cup to her lips. It sounded almost like a compliment to her. Chell smiled palely and sat across from her. This time, a quiet tea party dragged on for an hour, and all this time a deeply thoughtful girl drank one cup - the witch quietly poured her water until the tea turned pale yellow. During all this time, the princess did not say a word, she only sighed periodically and looked absently at the grandfather clock.  
"You do like hot water, I suppose?" - Glados grinned in an attempt to cheer up the ward. - "Especially with such a sour face".  
"Water can be delicious", - Chell smiled weakly. The woman seized on this glimpse of the girl’s usual cheerfulness.  
"Well, you know, with that kind of expression, even the water will turn sour. Do you really want to grow lingonberries on your face?"  
"To grow what?" - Chell looked up and saw a yellow-red caramel cane on the table in front of her.  
"You are ignorant. Lingonberry is a sour berry", - Glados nodded at the candy and poured tea leaves into her cup. - "Take it quickly before I change my mind".  
The girl turned the candy in her hands, rubbed with finger and stuck the tip in her mouth. She frowned a little, apparently from the sourness of lingonberry juice, but at the same time she smiled gratefully.  
"Do not break your teeth", - Glados pretended to be looking out for something on a shelf behind her — she wanted so much to smile back. - "And keep in mind that I am not your dad. I do not intend to pamper you".  
"Still thank you", - the princess broke a piece of cane and put it in her mouth, and wrapped the rest in a clean handkerchief and put it on the edge of the table. - "I, um, will finish with it later, yes".  
"You are welcome", - Glados glanced out the window. Evening was approaching, and the edge of the sky on the other side of the lake was already darkened. - "Hmm... I am reluctant to renew supplies today. We will prepare breakfasts and dinners for a week, that's what! You definitely need such a skill".


	12. Warm water

They went to bed far after midnight, tired even more than in the previous days. Glados, with the help of a conscientious princess, cooked two pots of vegetable soup and fried one piece of beef. The woman cooked all this with the help of the stove, and so deftly that Chell could only admire her. Thanks to the wise leadership of the witch, the girl pretty soon was able to peel vegetables herself and cut them into neat cubes, and when the woman pulled back the girl’s hand so that hersing oil would not burn her, the princess’s gratitude grew to heaven.  
"I still feel the onion juice in my hands", - Chell muttered through a dream, crumpling a cloak in her hands. Glados grunted, staring at the ceiling.  
"Cooking is no less dirty than cutting wood. Tomorrow we will need to wash ourselves, perhaps... Should I dip you in the lake?"  
"Will you also do this?" - Chell smiled dreamily. The witch snorted and hid the lower part of her face under the covers, although the princess could not see how Glados's cheeks turned pink.  
"Do not be silly. I will not undress in front of some girl. And I won’t keep an eye on you, I’ll send you to wash - and you can even drown... Can you swim, by the way?"  
The answer was a peaceful snooze.

***

Glados had no extra body towel, and since she herself wanted to go to the lake, the princess had to be content with a wide sheet. The witch did not allow her to get into the water near the house. Therefore, they got to the part of the coast covered with shorter grass, and Glados sat here, putting a basket nearby.  
"Is the water cold?" - Chell took off her boots, which the witch made her put on, and touched the smooth water surface with a finger visible from under the bandages on the feet.  
"I guess you won't freeze", - Glados chuckled, throwing a still dry towel over her shoulders. - "Go ahead, otherwise I will fall asleep here".  
The princess squinted at her.  
"That is... To undress _completely_?.."  
"If you know a way to wash in clothes - share it with humanity", - the witch defiantly moved a few steps and turned her back to the lake. - "Quickly, I do not want to spend all day on this either".  
The girl cringed, looking at the lake, but still pulled the ribbon from her hair, spread her tail and began to undress. Of course, she couldn’t wash up to crystal clear without soap, but the bathtub with all the amenities was left in the castle. Besides, she didn’t really want to go there now.

The witch covered her smile with her fingers, hearing a quiet splash. In fact, she had a small complex set of spells using the bottom of the barrel in the courtyard and the watering can connected by a spatial portal, which in general amounted to a good likeness of a soul. But the witch did not want to show the girl this creation of the genius of magical thought.  
But the idea of dipping the princess into a forest lake was amusing. And judging by how soon she got into the water, the girl was not very shy.  
It was tempting for a witch to look over her shoulder - a completely normal human desire, when something extraordinary happens behind your back, right? Crown Princess, almost alone, in cool lake water - what could be more extraordinary in this place?  
But Glados, of course, did not look back - she was above human desires, above society as a whole, and...  
"Ouch!" - a booming slap on the water was heard from behind. The witch immediately jumped to her feet and turned around. Having stumbled over either a snag, or about her own legs, or about bandages on them, Chell emerged from the water, spitting and removing her wet hair from her face. - "E... Everything is fine!" - she answered, seeing the witch's alarmed gaze, immediately covered herself with her hand and sat down so that only the neck was visible from the water. - "I just stumbled ... There is a bit too much algae near the shore, it seems I was stupid - I had to remove the bandages, they got caught in..."  
"I do not need your excuses!" - snapped out Glados, swiftly turning her back to Chell and sitting down, not even bothering to pick up the towel that had fallen from her shoulders.  
Her heart was beating like mad, and the witch did not quite understand - either from the sharp scream of the princess, or from the sight that the woman was able to watch for several seconds. And the sight was amazing. Despite the short stature, the future queen was well-built. The witch even managed to discern the muscles of the abdomen and arms in these few seconds - perhaps just because, with a huge effort of will, she did not allow her gaze to glide higher or lower.  
But these general observations were enough, and the imagination suddenly painted such an attractive and detailed image of her cheerful ward that the witch had to bite her knuckles for the second time in a week. This time - so as not to make a sound at all.  
"Maybe I should let her go today?" - the witch feverishly thought, mechanically stroking her left hand. - "Cut this knot in one... Gods! What am I thinking about? What hit? What knot? In any case, the girl must choose a groom from these... However, not everyone there is such as _this one_ , for sure! Otherwise, she would not have obeyed her father, look how happy she was at the curse... Yes, yes, she already has candidates, women do not fall in... And... And I hate people! Yes! However, letting her go now is such nonsense! This nosy king may suspect some new curse, they will come back to me again... Nothing actually happened. For a long time I have not seen pretty girls, and that is all! No matter how I hate people, I can not tear a human out of myself... At least in a physical sense. To hell! Let's leave it as it is".  
"Are you done?" - Glados raised her voice so that the girl could feel her impatience. - "Because of you, I can fall asleep again!"  
"I'm already comi-i-ing, miss", - bare feet splashed across the grass, and the witch seemed to be all petrified. Now it was hard for her not to turn around, but she resisted, clasping her knees with her hands and listening to the rustling behind her.  
"In general, I forbid you to hang around on the shore while I take a bath", - the witch said angrily, as soon as Chell touched her shoulder. - "Go and water the... N-no, no, go and hem... No! You will get hurt again! I guess you like it, huh? Hell, now I can not even think of a job so that you do not cripple yourself".  
"I can water the garden, you know..." - the girl began, but Glados only waved it off.  
"You know what? Take a bucket and a rag in the chest... Tap the lid five times. And wash the floor. We wash ourselves, and we also need to clean the house. But do not you dare to look at the lake, got it?"  
"I won't embarrass you", - Chell nodded and ran briskly toward the house. The witch looked her up to the door and began to take off her black dress.

Chell faithfully completed her assignment, carrying the rag on the floor as carefully as she could. The girl even guessed to move a heavy chest and temporarily put all the cloaks of her bed on a chair. However, the owner of the house did not return for a long time, and the princess was afraid to leave the house in order to pour dirty water from a bucket. She was frightened not so much by the consequences of her own disobedience as by the opportunity to see something, so the witch could immediately kick the girl out. But everything was so good, yesterday she suddenly turned out to be such a sweet and affectionate boss!  
Chell sighed. No, this feeling could not be allowed to develop. What for, if Glados still does not like people? She tirelessly reminded of this to the whole world and to the girl herself with every at least somewhat mocking remark. Well, at least she succeeded in...  
"And where is your vaunted ability to find something to do without me?" - Glados appeared inconspicuously for the princess, smiling and wiping her short hair with a towel. Bathing seemed to cheer her up a bit. - "Are you already bored without my sensitive guidance?"  
"Yes, I am", - suddenly the girl agreed. The witch allowed herself a laugh.  
"Well, if you are the same in state affairs, then I am already afraid for this kingdom! Apparently, you should also put a regent to you even after eighteen?"  
"Do you want this position?" - Chell suddenly answered with a sly smile. - "The place is not taken".  
"Only politics was missing", - Glados removed the gingerbread that was not touched by her yesterday from the shelf, broke a piece, put it in her mouth and put the dessert back in place. - "This jungle is worse than my forest... Which does not mean that I could not have done just fine, but why should I complicate my life?"  
"Oh, do you like gingerbread cookies?" - Chell bowed her head to one side, noticing a gleam of contentment in yellow eyes.  
"You can assume that I like bakery products in general, but do not like to smear hands with flour", - the witch grunted, savoring a piece of gingerbread. As always, she made a good choice - it was delicious.  
"I will take this into account", - Chell shrugged, looking expectantly at her.  
"Will you send me a bag of gingerbread?" - Glados pursed her lips so as not to grin. With this princess, it was generally more tempting to smile. The strangest thing is that the desire to suppress a smile gradually decreased. - "See that the postman is not lost along the way".  
"I'll bring you a bag myself", - Chell raised her chin and strangely looked into the eyes of the witch. - "I won't get lost".  
"Hah, sounds like a threat", - Glados, from such a look, for some reason blushed and rushed to the chest to hide it from the princess. - "So, stop talking. Dinner is still far away, we still have a lot to do... Go find yourself a stick, "knight". You will keep your promise and protect me".


	13. Light

Contrary to the word given to herself to keep herself colder, Glados felt an unusual, extraordinary warmth in relation to her ward. From this, the witch's gait came out more proud, and her eyes sparkled in a special way, avoiding falling on only the culprit of this mood.  
Chell walked nearby, again in boots, like an obedient girl, and squeezed, like a gun, one of the branches she had previously prepared for the scarecrow, which she had left in the yard. These sticks came in handy.  
"Look, do not let the birds come to me", - Glados demanded almost cheerfully and leaned over a bush of wild rose hips. The princess readily raised a stick and looked around menacingly, but the birdsong sounded from afar - apparently, this was also the effect of a potion prepared by a woman. Chell decided upon returning home to send several hunters to the forest - to reduce the bird population, so to speak.  
Walking behind the witch like a “tail” was much more fun than picking poisonous berries for her. So Chell could legally admire her benefactress from the back, trying to carefully capture in her memory the long fingers, created as if for musical instruments, rather than picking fruit, slender graceful wrists, straight posture, tall stature...  
She almost never thought about birds, and therefore managed to wave a branch at the very last moment, when a small sparrow flew almost half a meter from Glados. Fortunately, the woman did not notice this, and even sighed happily, cutting off a successfully found death cap.  
"Hey, you seem to attract plants", - the witch grinned. - "Today the basket is filling up pretty quickly. Why did not your magic work last time?"  
"There were more birds", - shrugged Chell, brandishing a branch menacingly. A magpie flew up from a tree and flew away with a terrible roar. - "For some reason, I also stop liking birds... Are they attracted to you, or what?"  
"There is no reason to like birds", - muttered Glados, mechanically rubbing her left hand. - "Absolutely none. Birds are like flying rats, and their "songs" are like only to someone who has stepped a bear on his ear".  
"Even the nightingales?" - the princess imperceptibly approached on a small step.  
"Only if there is a barred window between me and the nightingales", - the witch bit her lip. Chell shrugged and continued to follow her, when suddenly the woman stopped and looked at her carefully. - "Stop pushing me with questions in the air, you!"  
"I promised not to ask you", - the princess was embarrassed. Of course, she really wanted to ask, in fact, but not to break the promise!  
"But you want to", - Glados tapped her temple with her finger. - "And you think about it. It bothers me".  
"Do you read minds?" - Chell was surprised, waving away the insects.  
"What if I can?" - the witch looked down and half rolled up her sleeve. - "Willing you to look at this horror? But you will not get off, right?"  
"I, um... Yes?" - Chell hesitantly agreed, beginning, as it seemed to her, to understand something. She examined the traces of terrible burns on the witch's hand less carefully than the hand itself. Pale, graceful, it seemed to her the most beautiful female hand that the princess had ever seen.  
"Be content that it related to birds", - Glados lowered her sleeve and carefully straightened it. - "And to _real_ fire, too".  
"Oh... Are you afraid of fire? Then we will not make bonfires", - the girl smiled. The smile came out a little sadder than it should have been.  
"Not so much, but thanks for promising not to set fire to the forest", - the witch picked up the basket. - "Come on, come on, idler, before lunch tea I need a full basket!"

Glados herself did not understand why she had so much fun. When they returned to the house, it was already well after noon, the witch planted the girl to wash and peel the mushrooms, having previously chosen from the pile of edible mushrooms fly agaric and death caps. She commented on the process so that Chell would remember it well.  
"Why do you need so many mushrooms?" - the princess put her long-suffering fingers in her mouth. Due to a little rush, this peeling again decorated her hands with cuts, albeit in a smaller amount than the first time that her whole hand was bandaged.  
"Gonna salt them", - Glados stared at the girl’s slowly rising eyebrows for a second and snorted. - "No, all for potions. I hate mushrooms. Why do you take everything so seriously?"  
"You are usually serious", - shrugged Chell. The witch could not resist and laughed, taking off a book in a tattered green cover from a shelf.  
"This does not mean that I can't have fun, you fool! Maybe I am glad that Monday is coming and you will go home, eh?"  
The princess turned pale and hastened to lower her head. Meanwhile, the woman climbed onto the stove with a book, settled comfortably with a pillow under her back, and opened the book on her lap.  
The grandfather clock struck two in the afternoon.  
"I remember!" - Glados waved her hand. - "Hey girl, you can throw mushrooms and get yourself a meal. There is an box with ice in a chest - eight short knocks".  
"You won't eat?" - the girl put down the knife and dutifully set about putting dinner on the table. - "And... it’s not dark for you to read there?"  
"I will not, and it is not", - Glados pressed her knees, bringing the book closer to her face, and raised her hand. Instead of the usual blue sparks, white sparks ran in the witch's palm, and a ball of soft white light appeared over her fingers. The woman hung him in the air above the book so that he would cover the entire text on the pages and go deeper into reading. Chell sat down to dinner, and throughout the meal she looked strictly out the window.

Exactly at that moment when the princess took the last sip of tea, Glados put down the book and, squeezing a ball of light in her palm, extinguished it.  
"You have that face again, from which the water turns sour", - she noticed, looking at the princess. - "Are you short of air?"  
"No, no, I just... Thought", - Chell carefully unloaded the dirty dishes into the basin.  
"Wow, it’s good for you to be near smart people - you even learn to think", - the woman looked out the window. - "And the evening promises to be good! Look, the sky is cloudless".  
"Is that an omen?" - Chell also looked out the window. - "Dad says omens usually don't work".  
"The King of Labordi is simply not as good at them as he would have liked to be", - the witch grunted and suddenly grabbed Chell by the elbow. - "Well, let's go! Perhaps you are not so lost, and I can put at least some survival skills into this bad head!"  
"What for?" - the girl meekly followed her, pulling on her boots as she walked.  
"Do you prefer to remain a fool? No, this probably has its own charm for a bunch of your grooms, but in general it’s harmful to remain stupid. Especially when stupidity is combined with your furious stubbornness and excessive humanity, which is actually doubly harmful for the future queen".  
"Enough to constantly remind me of the grooms!" - Chell snatched her elbow out of the witch's hands in frustration and leaped back a few steps. - "All the rest of your jokes are funny, but these are not!"  
"Oh, wow, what a vulnerable soul", - Glados grinned, holding out her left hand. - "Are your grooms like birds or something? Okay, I’ll hold these beautiful witticisms, so that Your Highness didn’t run away and fall into some kind of hole, otherwise they will blame me for this".  
The princess stamped her leg angrily, which caused a mocking smile from the woman, but still she gave her hand. She could not be angry at the smiling Glados.  
The witch grabbed her elbow so as not to touch the open skin, and led the princess to the forest.


	14. Call

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> still alive

The sun, still hanging quite high above the trees, made the leaves like golden. Glados walked rather slowly, as if searching for something, but in fact letting the princess enjoy the view of the evening forest.  
Nevertheless, for some reason Chell constantly looked at the witch. This made the woman feel a little uncomfortable, but at the same time caused strange goosebumps that could not be called quite unpleasant.  
"Hey", - the witch began in order to dilute Chell’s attention to her person - "You asked me if the poison that you poured on the birds' nests, would poison the birds themselves, right?"  
"And, yes, I asked... You said that basically it would scare them away".  
"It will poison them too", - witch grinned. - "We have processed the most convenient places for nests in the district. The smell will scare away the birds, and even the bark and insects on these trees will become poisonous to them for a while. Mostly thanks to ezloi, but some herbs will enhance the effect... I used to poison them for a long time, carefully, so that they were afraid for half a kilometer to fly to this side of the lake. And then somehow... Relaxed".  
"Maybe you should process everything here again?" - worried Chell. - "Or... I can send hunters to the forest when I get home".  
"No hunters here!" - snapped out the women. - "That nerd with the old man was enough for me! People began to visit this forest too often. I have not scared you all away for a long time, that is what. Previously, only desperate soldiers decided to ride through this forest!"  
"Ah, right, dad talked about it", - princess smiled. - "It was as if the ghosts of old warriors and dragons were seen here. But these are fairy tales".  
"These are hallucinogenic mixtures in the smoke of magic fire", - Glados grinned, looking into the girl's face. Princess eyes widened in surprise. - "Oh, I see that you did not know, right? Well, I know that mixtures can affect not only the sense of smell".  
The girl's eyes lit up with delight. She did not quite understand the art of her temporary master, but the idea of ghosts caused by potions in the air delighted her.  
"There is no need to throw such puppy looks at me", - Glados turned away. Immediately it occurred to her that very often she turned away to hide the rosy cheeks from the princess, and she pretended to be listening. The witch even raised her hand, urging the girl to silence. - "Shoo!.. Did you hear that?"  
"What?" - Chell listened, and then some noise really came to them. As if nearby, someone was pushing through a forest.  
"What the..." - Glados tightly squeezed the princess's elbow and silently, but quickly crept closer to the source of noise. Chell barely managed to rearrange her legs, following the witch, and several times painfully stumbled against the roots, but did not utter a sound.

The witch stopped as abruptly as she ran, so the girl accidentally crashed into her back. Glados immediately pressed her to the tree and put her finger to her lips.  
Nearby, several people were talking quietly.  
"And what, Rick, His August hit his head hard?" - chuckling, one voice was interested. Another, in which one could easily distinguish boastful notes, even when the subject did not touch its owner personally, laughed muffledly.  
"Yes! Eh, you should have seen how this important lump was brought to the palace! Lying on his own face, as if he had already thrown off the hooves! My friend, this skull can be smashed with a click, how did he not go to his venerable grandfather from a hit from a branch?"  
"And what did he feel like getting into the forest? With a gun..." - asked a lazy third voice, barely familiar to Chell. The first and third, it seems, were father's rangers, but she recognized the second at once - of course, such a tone, albeit quiet, immediately betrayed baron Rick with his head.  
"Well, the hell knows!" - baron answered. - "He probably wanted to shoot the squirrels to make the princess a fur collar, ha ha! He’s a fool, he’s not really able to hold a gun..."  
"But, Baron, do not forget that he is not such a coward as he seems", - noticed a lazy voice, - "although a fool ... That's right. Oh, gentlemen, no one saw my hunting horn?"  
"Did you lose it again?" - Rick grinned as if there were at least ten pretty young ladies around him. - "You are incorrigible, my friend! How do we find moose here?"  
"Are there moose in this forest?" - the first doubted. All three laughed.  
"Does it really matter? For the sake of our valor, we’ll certainly shoot something!"  
Talking almost in full voice and joking, the hunters retreated to the side of the lake.

Chell glanced at the witch and pressed herself closer to the tree. The woman gripped the princess's hand tightly and looked terribly angry.  
"No, well, this is definitely the height of arrogance! Since when have all kinds of pompous imbeciles come here to hunt?"  
"I don’t remember seeing anyone bigger than a squirrel or a crow here..." - muttered the princess, biting her lip - squeezing her palm became painful. - "M-miss Glados?"  
"Stop calling me "miss"!" - the woman became angry, but quietly, in case the hunters had not gone far enough. - "Nothing to remind me of my status! Just "Glados", but not without respect!"  
"Oh, I forbid everyone to even poke their nose into your area of the forest, if only you would not be angry", - Chell winced in pain, and the witch immediately let go of her hand, as if afraid of her own anger.  
"It would be nice", - Glados nodded coldly, brushing off her hand. - "I do not want to spend half of my supplies again so that no one would meddle in my collecting lands. I already need to poison the birds again..."  
"Well, I’ll ask dad to declare this forest ... Say, the sacred territory of the goddess of Nature, and no one will touch you", - the girl smiled. This peaceful smile calmed Glados down.  
"Yes, good idea", - she nodded restrainedly, trying not to turn away suspiciously, although her cheeks began to turn pink again. - "Ahem... However, I wonder why they got the idea that there are moose here? Here you rarely see a rabbit, but if you are as noisy as this procession, the forest will be completely empty".  
"They are fools", - the princess said in a very similar tone to the witch's tone and laughed muffledly. Glados grinned back.  
"Bad hunters... Should we follow them?"  
"Oh, by the way, but they won’t find your house?" - the princess was suddenly worried. - "Who knows what they’ll think of!"  
"They will not", - the woman waved her hand, grabbing the girl by the elbow again. - "My house has much stronger illusory-spatial charms than on a chest, for example. It cannot be found unless I myself brought you there by the hand".  
"Aw... Ouch!" - Chell, forced to trudge again at Glados for some reason, stumbled over another sudden root and almost fluttered her nose, falling to the ground. Fortunately, the witch managed to turn around and catch the girl with both hands, but the princess at the same time buried her face in her collarbone.  
"S... Stop falling, please!" - the witch's voice trembled, and she hastened to put Chell on her feet and pretend to cough. - "Ahem! Will you normally move your legs or have forgotten how?"  
"You-you just go too fast", - Chell was confused. When falling onto a woman, a familiar smell hit her nose so that for a moment the girl had a desire to hug the witch stronger, but she easily overcame it.  
But the ghost of desire still loomed before her eyes.  
"How slowly you get used to it!" - the woman rolled her eyes and held out her hand. - Elbow. So be it, we will go a little slower".

Glados rightly decided that since the hunting company did not represent anything interesting, then there was no need to follow them, and therefore led the princess not after the baron and the rangers, but deeper into the forest.  
"Where... Where are we going?" - Chell asked hesitantly, turning her head. This part of the forest was definitely unfamiliar to her, and besides, the sky began to darken.  
"We are... just walking", - witch shrugged. - "We walk through the woods. Something like that".

They walked a little more and found themselves in a meadow already familiar to the woman. With the onset of the evening, the lilies of the valley dropped slightly and the small flowers closed up, but a faint, delicate smell still hung in the air.  
"Oh, lilies of the valley again", - princess smiled. - "Just like in your home..."  
"Only these still bloom", - Glados let go of the girl's hand and sat on the grass. - "My bouquet needs to be replaced already".  
"Do you like lilies of the valley?" - Chell sat next to her, hugging her knees. The witch bowed her head to one side.  
"Is it so unobvious?"  
"Just asking", - girl shivered. The witch grunted and lay right in the thicket of flowers.  
"Yes, I like them. Only good memories are associated with them. My parents, for example, grew lilies of the valley in their garden".  
"Wow", - girl squared her shoulders a little, - "and my dad grows mostly lemon trees. And he uses lemons only in coffee, and nowhere else! I don’t know what pushes him to it, really".  
"Well, my parents just loved lilies of the valley", - Glados bent a few stems to her face and took a deep breath. - "Do you know that the berries of the lily of the valley are poisonous? I use them sometimes. I would grow it in my own area, but they do not take root with me".  
"I did not know about that", - the princess stretched her legs, moving slightly towards the witch, and leaned on her hands. Something strange came under the left. - "Oh! Look, there’s some kind of birch bark pipe".  
"Hm?" - the witch looked at the pipe in Chell's hands. - "This is some kind of hunting horn. I think the one that those hunters lost".  
"Hunting horn?" - the girl turned the pipe in her hands. - "You can’t say something about it that it is able to make the sounds of an animal".  
"Just do not blow into it, for Gods' sake. You never know who took it in mouth", - Glados pursed her lips. The girl nodded, put a horn in her belt, and lay in lilies of the valley a step away from the witch. - "Hey..." - the woman reached out and touched Chell by the shoulder. - "You probably study astronomy?"  
"I learned a little astronomy, huh", - the girl carefully looked at the dark blue sky. The western edge was still glowing pink. - "Well... It's still hard to see, but those small stars that make up an uneven circle are called the Crystal Ball, for example".  
"I do not really understand the constellations", - Glados admitted, slightly moving her hand between her and Chell closer to the princess. The girl crossed her arms more sharply than it should have, and the witch immediately pressed her hand to the hem of the dress. - "Well, not because I can not, of course. This does not come in handy in my work. Usually I rather need to know the position and phase of the moon".  
"Actually, I don’t really need astronomy either... Unless to navigate the stars, and then usually I do not have to leave the castle before nightfall", - Chell squinted at the witch's hand clenched into a fist, startled, as if from a cold, and put her hand on the grass. Glados shrugged, turned her face slightly, and pulled her palm so that they both almost felt the warmth of each other's hands.  
"Do you know what the "Poisonous moon" is?" - the witch asked in an undertone, turning her face a little bit to the sky.  
"No, I don't".  
"Oh it is... Interesting night", - Glados pointed to the moon slowly floating out from behind the dark spruce tops. It lacked a very small piece to be called full. - "During the full moon, the moon sometimes turns red. Do you know that?"  
"Oh... Yes, I think I saw it a couple of times", - the princess creeped, reducing the distance between her and Glados, and looked timidly at the woman. She looked at the sky, but smiled as if she had noticed the girl's movements. Probably she _noticed_. The little fingers of the ladies touched for a moment, and they shuddered, as if an electric current had run through their hands.  
Ahem... Well, these nights are called "Poisonous moon". Among people with magical blood, at least. In summer they are the best, herbs and flowers bloom especially wildly in one night, even something that is usually not growing here... Judging by the state of the moon, the full moon will begin just next week".  
"Oh, sad. I would help you with the collection... You surely will go to the collection?"  
"Surely", - Glados bit her lip and looked away. - "Well. Em. If... you will not be very... busy... with it all... Maybe you could come. You are kind of not completely useless in terms of... Help".  
"I will try to", - Chell shone with joy. The witch smiled again and nudged her.  
"Look, do not die of happiness until then! Otherwise, there will be nobody to peel the mushrooms for me".  
"Hah, I will try!" - the girl laughed, desperate to once again quietly touch witch's hand. Glados moved her hand so that the girl’s palm grabbed only the grass, but immediately covered her fingers with hers. The princess abruptly cut off her laughter and froze, afraid to even breathe too loudly.  
"You are a good person, you know", - the woman said calmly, although her fingers trembled. - "At least the best I know. Although a fool".  
"The princess blushed, but said nothing. Glados, however, did not expect an answer - it was enough for her that Chell did not remove her hand from beneath her palm.  
The witch squeezed the girl's palm, continuing to look straight up at the sky.

They lay there until the sky became completely dark, and the stars and the moon flared up so brightly that the ladies could clearly see each other's faces. This terribly embarrassed Glados, and she sat up, not releasing Chell's hand from hers.  
"Ahem... It is getting cold. Home time, dinner and sleep. You will catch a cold".  
"Okay", - the princess sat down, trying not to look at the witch, but she had already risen and pulled the ward along with her. - "Can I keep the horn for myself?"  
"Just wash it... The part into which to blow, at least. At least wipe with something".  
Chell leaned over, trying not to let go of her pale hand, and set about wiping her horn on her leg. Glados grinned.  
"You can open your palm for now. I will not run away".  
"Well, no, miss... Glados", - the princess smiled so tenderly that the witch caught her breath. - "With your permission, I would continue to hold your hand".  
"H-hah, whatever", - the witch regretted that she did not have a cloak with her to cover her face. It seemed to burn, although Chell did not look directly at her.  
"Have you ever heard a moose roar?" - the princess asked as they went a little deeper into the forest.  
"Where from? I tell you, moose have never been here. And where I lived in childhood, too", - the witch tightened her grip on the girl's palm.  
"Hah, I’m interested... I didn’t hear either", - the girl on the go pulled a horn from her belt. - "May I try?"  
"Oh, right now?" - Glados stopped. - "Are you a child? Can't you wait until we get home? What if hunters from all over the area come running here?"  
"They’ve already left, I think... A lot of more responsive girls and wine are waiting for them in the city", - Chell snorted.  
"Alright", - the witch reluctantly agreed. - "But only once. And at home you will wash your face, for Gods' sake, I still do not trust this horn".  
The girl nodded and brought the birch bark pipe to her lips.  
The forest announced a wild, rattling moan, as if the voice of a wounded man had increased a hundredfold.  
"Ah!" - Glados knocked the pipe out of the girl’s hands. - "Never touch it again!"  
"Ah..." - Chell herself barely recovered from such a terrible sound. - "Damn it, it was worse than..."  
"There! A sound from there!" - screamed nearby. The witch turned around:  
"What the? Are these fools yet..."  
She was cut off by several shots at once. The woman grabbed her side and silently settled on the grass.  
"G-Glados?" - Chell rushed to her. In the rare moonlight breaking through the leaves, it became clear that a dark spot was spreading out on the side of the black dress.  
"Diagonally..." - muttered the witch with a wandering gaze. Trembling hands glowed orange and drew a curved portal frame in the air.  
The princess understood everything without words and quickly dragged her into the house.  
"Something is glowing here!" - shouted very close. Glados, with all her might, waved and sent a small ball lightning to the portal. Judging by the screams and cod, this turned out to be a very effective intimidation.  
The witch grinned weakly and drooped in the princess's arms.


	15. Glimpse

When she somehow found and lit several candles from the fire in the stove, Chell had to overcome both terrible embarrassment and numbness of fear in order to put the unconscious witch on a bed of cloaks and remove her dress. From her experience, the princess, who sometimes watched the hunt, and who handled the gun well, concluded that her mistress got off easily - she only got one bullet, and even that bullet was not stuck in the body, but simply passed along a tangent, although it tore skin covering. And judging by the more-than-usual pale face, the witch lost consciousness rather from fright then pain or blood loss.  
The girl calmed down a bit after examining the wound and took up as much as she could to care for Glados. She herself often received scratches and other minor injuries both in childhood and youth, although overexcited hunters never tried to shoot her with a gun in the dark. First of all, the girl washed the bleeding wound with water from the teapot left over from lunch, put clean bandages under Glados's side, not daring to start bandaging her herself, but wishing at least to restrict the access of any infection. Then the princess pulled out a jar of ointment from the chest, which the witch herself had supplied her a few days ago, and, having thought of nothing else, even to calm herself, sat down right on the floor at the feet of Glados to wait until she woke up. Chell's thoughts were so busy that the woman woke up as soon as possible that it did not even occur to her to examine the patient - the girl's gaze wandered from a white, like a canvas, face exclusively to a red spot on the woman's side and back.  
After a while, Glados stirred, groaned, and barely opened her eyes.  
"Ah-ah, how it rings... Ow... Ah!" - upon awakening, the witch immediately felt her wound and tried to sit up, but Chell quickly pressed her back to her cloaks. - "Hey, you fool, what the... Ah!"  
"They shot you", - stammering on almost every syllable, the princess said. Her eyes sparkled. - "This... Oh, Gods, it's all my fault... Stupid horn!"  
"What?" - the woman grimaced, putting her hand to the bloody marks on her side. - "Wow, a bit too much... flowed out... Hey, wait, do not start crying!"  
The girl looked at the wound with wide eyes, and tears flowed down her face. Her conscience gnawed at her that she even took this unfortunate horn in her hands - it would have been better to throw it into the river altogether!  
"H-hey", - despite the pain, Glados smiled weakly, - "now your eyes will swell, and who will bandage my wounds under my careful guidance?"  
"S-sorry", - Chell wiped her eyes. - "W-what should I do?"

Glados had to cauterize the wound herself, because there was no real fire in the house, but with the help of magic fire, she coped pretty well. The princess, under her leadership, poured everything with alcohol, from which the witch only winced a little, processed the edges of the wound with ointment and sealed everything with a plaster. Chell's hands trembled on contact with the delicate pale skin on her side, and every time she tried to pull her hand back, but the woman's gaze kept her from doing so.  
"Are you afraid of me, or what?" - Glados grunted as the wound disappeared under the bandages. - "Oh... Well, these dummies will get it when I find them!"  
"Uh-huh", - Chell nodded and covered her face with her hands, feeling the tears begin to flow again. The witch sighed, having no idea how to calm the girl, and put her hand on her palm.  
"Hey. I did not seem to die. Why mourn me so much?"  
The princess suddenly caught Glados's hand with hers and pressed long thin fingers to her lips, flooding them with tears. The witch froze and covered her face with her free hand in order to at least slightly hide the blush. She let the girl cry in her hand, and when Chell had already begun to hiccup from crying, she overcame herself and took the princess by the chin.  
"Do not cry", - asked the witch as kindly as possible. - "It is not your fault that these fools mistook the sound of their own hunting horn for a moose howl. You nevertheless dragged me out of there, and... You are taking care... of me... And the wound seems to be not serious, although it hurts... Please, stop it!"  
"Sorry", - Chell hissed, grabbing the witch's hand by the wrist so that she would not remove it. But the woman did not even think to take her palms away, only shrugged her shoulders.  
"Cool... Somehow... On the floor with no clothes on... Hey, we need to finish my dressing. Maybe you can put me on my bed later?"  
Chell nodded, wiped away her tears with the hem of her shirt, and took the bandages. She had to help the woman to sit up, despite the pain in her side, and while Glados tried not even to breathe properly, so as not to strain the accidentally damaged area, the princess bandaged the witch, trying not to breathe, just not to smell her, and not to lower her gaze to the slender witch's waist.  
"My eyes are higher", - the woman smiled weakly. Chell raised her head and met the gaze of Glados, blushing to her shoulders, still holding her bandaged hand against the witch's healthy side. - "Ugh... Well, you are too close. And I have too few clothes on. Be so kind as to tie the bandage and at least give me a cloak".  
The girl was embarrassed, instantly tied a bandage and wrapped the witch in the cleanest cloak. She lay down and winced.  
"Damn it, moving is awfully unpleasant. Hmm... Maybe I will sleep in your place".  
"Then I can pull down your blanket for you", - the girl fussed, put a pillow under the Glados's head, covered her with a blanket and sat down again at her feet, ready to serve as something else.  
"I am afraid you are having dinner without me today", - the woman sighed weakly and winced again. - "Uh... I can't get a piece down my throat. But you must have dinner!"  
Chell obeyed meekly, set the table and sat down to supper, her worried eyes fixed on the witch. The woman pretended to nap to give the girl a quiet meal and watch herself. Little by little, the princess seems to have calmed down, and admired the witch so much that she almost carried a spoonful of vegetable soup past her mouth. Then Chell woke up, quickly finished her dinner, cleaned up and ran out into the street.  
Glados listened and heard the splash of water.  
"So soon she will have to carry water again", - she muttered in emotion, looking at the hand that Chell put to her lips. The girl, it seems, did not notice herself that she was gripping the witch's hand, damaged by the flame. Fingers seemed to burn from the girl's touches and tears, and this heat spread throughout the body in a cozy warmth. No one has ever mourned her wounds as bitterly as the princess she cursed, and even more so no one would ever act with her as bravely as that fool Chell.  
The witch felt the corners of her eyes moisten with emotion and too much gratitude for her, and hastened to dry her eyes until the princess returned.  
"I won't give you the blanket, but you can sleep on my bed today", - noticed Glados, trying to move. The wound immediately responded with pain, and the witch decided to stay in this position.  
"What if you need something at night? I can.." - Chell hesitated, looked from the witch to the grandfather clock and silently climbed onto the stove.

***

Chell woke up early and immediately began making strong morning tea for the witch. Glados was still asleep. In a dream, judging by the position of the cloaks, she tried to roll over, but the pain in her side did not allow her to do it. The girl carefully tucked the blanket over to the witch and adjusted the pillow. Glados groaned painfully in her sleep, either from a wound or from a disturbed dream. Chell sat down next to Glados, holding a cup of tea, and timidly stroked the witch's head. This had a calming effect on the woman, and she pressed her cheek to the palm of the princess.  
The girl did not dare to take her hand away.

"Oh... good morning", - Glados yawned into her palm, stretched, and immediately pursed her lips painfully. - "Oh you... Hey, how long have you been sitting like this?"  
"I sit like this for half an hour", - the princess lied, removing her stiff hand from under the witch's face. - "You dreamed of something unpleasant, I wanted to help".  
"You can not help it", - the woman muttered. - "Well, I am kind of ready to try to get up, huh... Although it still hurts, of course, even scratches heal for a long time, and here it is..."  
"I can warm up some tea", - Chell jumped up, but the woman tugged at her pant leg.  
"No, no, leave the cup and help me sit down at the table. They did not shoot me in the leg, in the end!"  
The girl offered her a shoulder, and Glados first sat down, choosing the most successful movements so that her side did not hurt so much with every breath. Then the princess, without waiting for instructions, picked up the mistress of the house in her arms and carried her to the chair, where she let the witch to sit.  
"Uh-huh... Wow", - the witch chuckled timidly and dropped her shoulders. - "Remind me, why do you need a prince if you can do that?"  
"I don't need a prince", - Chell went back to the stove to reheat the teapot. Her heart was pounding like mad, palms from touching pale skin seemed to burn. - "Um... No sugar for you, right?"  
"I will not put sugar in my cup myself", - Glados shrank in her chair, staring at the back of the girl's head. - "And, um, let me get dressed in something! As if I am pleased to flaunt in underwear only".  
Judging by the witch's tone, she wouldn't mind a little medical examination, but the princess dutifully brought her a clean black dress from the chest.  
"There's blood on that other dress", - Chell's voice faltered, - "and I don’t know how to wash the blood".  
"Cold water and baking soda", - Glados got up, again with the help of the girl, and somehow, over her head, sighing every minute and biting her lip, pulled on the dress. Actually, thanks to the decontamination and the ointment, it hurt not so much, but with every breath of the woman Chell wrinkled her nose so sweetly that Glados could not help herself. - "But okay, I will see later what happened to it... Now, isn't that better? We will do without looking at this scar".  
"I-I like your a-arms", - Chell's voice was very low. She bit her lip. - "They are p-pretty".  
"Ha... H-ha-ha", - Glados put her hand to her forehead. Her face burned. - "Please stop complimenting me or I will overheat".  
"B-but I... I-I l-l..." - Chell covered her face with her hands. All the appropriate words got stuck in her throat so that it became difficult for her to breathe.  
"Oh, Gods. No, no, please do not finish the sentence", - Glados coughed and drank a cup of her already cold tea in one fell swoop. - "Uh... Better add boiling water".


	16. Magic blood

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i revived! from studying and playing... something  
> Happy New year btw

After several hours of quiet little errands and a meal that Glados was forced to eat, the witch touched her wound through her dress and winced.  
"It's been a long time since I was hurt so badly", - she sighed. - "The last time the blood flowed like that... Literally years... How many, ten ago?"  
"You look pretty young", - Chell said, removing the gingerbread from the shelf.  
"Hey, what are you doing? I planned to save it for later", - the witch tapped her fingers on the table. - "And there is no need to flatter".  
"No, no, really, you look at most thirty years old", - Chell put the gingerbread in front of the witch and poured her some tea.  
"I will not touch it now", - Glados frowned. - "I do not have much money to..."  
"I'll send you a bag of gingerbread every month, just eat some more", - the princess moved the chair so that she sat on the side of the woman, not opposite, and stared at her seriously. Glados gritted her teeth, but broke off a piece of gingerbread.  
"It would be better if you washed my dress, honestly... By the way, don't let those damn birds come near until you wash off the blood".  
"Why?" - Chell stubbornly moved the gingerbread closer to the witch. The woman closed her eyes and sighed heavily.  
"Birds are attracted to magical blood. I do not know why this is so, but as soon as they smell it, especially to birds of prey, they flock like bees to sugar".  
"Oh... Oh, that's why?.." - the girl turned her gaze to the injured hand, which Glados automatically grabbed onto. The witch lowered her head without opening her eyes.  
"It is a hundred times easier for them to attack a child, of course... I was about five or six years old... We lived with my parents in a rather large village, all the neighbors seemed to be familiar, friendly... Do you know why I do not like people? It would be good if you were hated openly, I can somehow understand this hatred, this hatred is at least honest... But when they smile at your family during the day, they buy potions and amulets from them, and then in their kitchen they discuss that these are the servants of the Devil, and their daughter is a witch's offspring... Hatred under the guise of hypocrisy is much worse".  
"But... Don't you have an innate magic?" - Chell asked carefully. The witch nodded.  
"Innate. Do you think many were worried about it then? There are still few open magicians, but then, while the old king, your Cave's father, was on the throne, it was even worse... So, overall, your father is not that bad. Everyone says the king is weird, but what's wrong with him? You are strange too, but I still put up with you".  
Glados's hands trembled at these words. The girl took her palms in hers and began to stroke the witch's pale knuckles with her thumbs. The witch was silent for a while, trying to pull herself together.  
"This is strange. In childhood, everyone said that I looked like my father, but now, looking in the mirror, I rather see my mother".  
"Did they also have white hair and yellow eyes?" - Chell moved a chair a little. Glados nodded.  
"The mother's were rather greenish, but in general... Yes. This is not found in all people of magical blood, but it does. And they were both magicians. And not the poorest people, you know? When you are able to heal flu and broken leg with herbalism and healing magic equally easily, you are unlikely to be poor".  
"How can you not like your doctor? After all, then he can poison you", - Chell looked away.  
"You can. Trust me. Otherwise, I would not have woken up once from the heat and the smell of smoke. I have no idea which of these traitors set fire to our house... But there was no one else to do this. Rejoice that you live in a castle - stone buildings do not flare up as quickly as wooden ones".  
"Oh, sorry, I shouldn't have asked", - The princess immediately pulled her hands away, but Glados grabbed her by the tips of the fingers.  
"No, no, I... It's okay. Simple human curiosity. And for me... You know... It's a little easier".  
Chell took the woman's hands in hers again. Glados blushed and looked out the window at the row of bright sunflower heads.  
"I got out somehow. My parents' room was on the second floor, mine was on the first. They simply did not have time to really wake up, I think... Maybe they suffocated in the smoke - the nights were cool, and they often closed the windows..."  
"Was your hand... injured there?" - the girl whispered in a trembling voice, squeezing the witch's hands as if she wanted to stick to her. Glados nodded.  
"The ceiling collapsed above me, right on my hand. While I was trying to get out, it was terribly burned, in several places the skin was torn..." - the woman leaned back in her chair, closed her eyes, and swallowed hard several times. Chell poured her water, and the witch gratefully washed down the bitterness of her story. - "Um... That's it. And as soon as I jumped out into the street, these creatures appeared. I do not know why they are so attracted to... Crows. This is the worst part. They did not care that I was still alive and I was fighting back as best I could. Some of the scars are from their beaks and claws".  
Glados took a deep breath and bit her lip. Chell shook her head and jumped up.  
"Enough for now, please. It's hard for you to remember everything... This. If you still will... Want to... Share this - I am always ready to listen to the end, but now you need to rest".  
The witch nodded and allowed herself to be pulled back onto the bed of cloaks.  
"Do you know what's the funniest thing?" - she said slowly, looking at the princess collecting dishes in a basin. - "From our house, the fire spread to others. That's why I said that those responsible for this are dead. That village burned to the ground, and all I feel sorry for is our garden".  
"I will give you a new garden", - Chell covered the witch better and bent over her forehead, but immediately straightened up and ran to the table. - "And no, I will try not to get lost on the way to the river!"  
"Let's go", - muttered Glados, sinking into a light nap from caring for her.

This time, the trip to the river was without incident. The princess hastily washed the dishes, almost drowning several plates, sat down for a while with her legs lowered into the water, examining the almost healed scratches on her feet and basking in the almost hot sun this Saturday, and finally wandered home. She almost did not think about the two days remaining in this wonderful place - all the girl's thoughts were occupied by a witch who needed help and witch's childhood. "Do scars grow with a person?" - thought Chell, skirting a few gnarled tree stumps. - "Although, she's magical blood ... Gods, what kind of things are happening in my country? It will be necessary to take her to the doctor... Oh... "  
The princess froze, already putting her foot on the slope of a small hill. She suddenly remembered that she had invited Glados to her party. Will a witch appear with such trauma? To see her in the palace, among a crowd of boring grooms, in a more elegant dress?.. And what is even worse - Glados will see the princess _herself in a dress_!  
The girl shook her head and quickened her pace.

Glados was awakened by the barely audible creak of the door. Chell arranged the dishes and sat down at the table.  
The grandfather clock chimed quietly. It was three o'clock.  
"How time flies", - sighed the witch. - "The day after tomorrow is a new week".  
"...It's a pity", - the girl lowered her head. - "Your home is good".  
"Do not you miss your father?" - the witch grinned sadly.  
"I miss him. But now my help will be less useful to him. Maybe we should take you to the doctor?"  
"Maybe later", - the witch stretched, tasting the sensation of the wound. It hurt and she stopped moving. - "Uh... I can hardly make it to the castle".  
"Then I will come with a doctor to you", - the princess declared firmly. Glados covered the lower part of her face with the cloak and smiled.  
"Oh, well, I can not forbid you. Just while you lead him, blindfold him with something, and on the way back too, so that he does not find his way here himself".  
"When will it stop hurting?" - the princess moved to the witch's feet. She shrugged.  
"Now I would treat it again with ointment... In a couple of days, probably. But it will take a long time to heal".  
"Let's treat it then", - Chell brought in the ointment and pulled on the witch's cloak. However, the woman suddenly grabbed onto the makeshift blanket and shook her head.  
"No, no, you'd better go get some water into the barrel again... Now things should go well. I will treat the wound myself".  
"You can't do it without help", - the girl said so convincingly that Glados frowned.  
"Interesting. For so many years, without someone else's help, I managed with my sores, and then there was some kind of scratch - and you write me down as infirm?"  
"This is not the point", - Chell took the witch's hands, trying in vain to disengage her fingers. - "I... I am worried about you!"  
"Fell in love, or what?" - the witch almost snapped out, powerlessly letting go of her cloak. The girl tightly compressed her lips and began to sit down the mistress of the house in order to take off her dress. Glados bit her lip and looked away. The princess treated the wound in the same silence.  
"Okay, I am sorry", - the witch continued a little more quietly. - "I... already said. You are the best person that I have come across, and it is hard to put up with my dislike for people".  
"I understand... I think I understand", - Chell nodded. - "My father calls these things a "hedgehog dilemma".  
"Oh, is our king a scientist?" - the woman chuckled with almost her usual sarcastic intonation. - "And what is this dilemma?"  
"The closer you get to a person, the more likely you are to experience pain?" - the princess looked thoughtful as she reapplied the plaster and bandages. - "It seems so. Dad used to say this when he told me about mom. They had a contractual marriage, but they managed to fall in love with each other even before the wedding... He says so, at least".  
"I heard something like that, yes... I remember there was a huge mourning for the queen", - This time Glados looked directly at the princess's temple so as not to embarrass herself with anything else. With her peripheral vision, the woman noticed that a strand of hair had broken out of the girl's unpretentious hairstyle, and mechanically, before she herself thought of anything, tucked the princess's hair behind her ear. Chell held a sigh for a second, but said nothing. - "Well, I did not mean to remind you about..."  
"Everything is fine", - the girl tied a new bandage and impulsively hugged the witch. - "You did share yours today... You have the right".  
Glados froze for a moment with her arms raised, and just as the princess was about to let her go, she put her palms on Chell's back, responding to a hug.  
"Thanks for taking care of me", - she muttered under her breath. - "I would have done it myself, but... It would have been more difficult for me. Thank you".


End file.
